Meeting: 27 March 2010
Guest Speaker: Peter Walker
Grace
Grace was said by John Gallimore.
“God bless this bunch who munch this lunch. Amen”.
The Menu
Chicken Liver Paté; Lamb Chop with roasted vegetables, apple potatoes, and Cider jus; Cheese and Biscuits; Coffee and Mints
Apologies for Absence
Apologies had been received from Derek Andrews, Clive Barnett, the Reverend David Brown, Roy Clarke, Roger Gibbons, Stephen Green, Neil Jenkinson, Dick Orders, Stephen Saunders, Ralph Shipway, and Peter and Bobby Tompkins.
Roger Gibbons’ apology: “Please accept my apologies for non-attendance at the lunch on Saturday 27th March 2010, as I have a prior commitment on that day; I shall be presenting a set of accounts to the Annual General Meeting of the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians in Derby.
I shall be sorry not to see my good friend Peter Walker, once quite wrongly and shamefully described to me as “A Journeyman Cricketer”. He will remember the occasion well. For an accomplished international all-around cricketer, he is possibly unique, in that he achieved both his best bowling figures (7-58) and his highest score (152*) in the same match against Middlesex at Lord’s (where better) in 1962.”
Election of Officers
President – Douglas Mille, proposed by Andrew Renshaw, seconded by Penny Taylor and voted unanimously
Treasurer – Stephen Saunders, proposed by Penny Taylor, seconded by Andrew Renshaw, and voted unanimously
Steward – Dick Orders, proposed by Jo Coulson, seconded by Oliver Howard, and voted unanimously
Secretary – Penny Taylor. Having been Secretary for 8 years felt it was time she handed over to someone else. The President said they were very grateful for what she had done over the years for the detailed Newsletters.
Newsflash – Lou Allen has very kindly agreed to take on the role of Secretary from Penny after the October lunch.
Subscription Renewal
The President reminded the meeting that it was the time of year to ask existing members and any visitors who wished to join to pay the annual subscription of 3 guineas (£3.15). He hoped that more people would choose to pay by standing order as this would reduce the risk of losing members who had been unable to attend a lunch.
Prize Draw in support of Hambledon Cricket Club
The customary draw was conducted and after deduction of the .prize and the speaker’s lunch and expenses, raised £120 in aid of Youth Cricket at Hambledon Cricket Club. The winner of the draw prize (the cost of lunch) was Ray Cook.
The Loyal Toasts
The President raised the traditional loyal toasts, regularly made back in the 18th Century, assuring anyone new to the Hambledon Club that these were the real thing:
The Queen’s Mother, The King, The Hambledon Club, Cricket, The immortal memory of Madge.
Andrew Renshaw raised the toast to The President.
Miscellany
Penny read two poems to the meeting that she had found on the internet:
Reflections
I bowl to my reflection in the outside kitchen door;
Then, switching to a batsman’s role, I face myself once more.
Was ever bowler quite so subtle with his sleight of hand?
Or ever batter quite so quick to read & understand?
Such wealth of cricket expertise by subterfuge concealed
Deserts me from the moment that I step onto the field!
By Arthur Salway
Facing Facts
I’m getting old, I’m getting plump, the future’s looking murky;
The only bird I’ll ever pull will be the Christmas turkey!
My buckskin boots need insoles and the moths have got my flannels,
And games of cricket aren’t forthcoming from the usual channels.
I wait to be selected but I wait ’til “ad finitum”;
My club’s defunct and half my kit is a collector’s item.
My sweater doesn’t fit me and my stripey cap is smelly,
And Sky T.V. has bought the rights to cricket on the telly.
Another summer’s come and gone, and another season passed.
It seems that game three years ago was probably my last.
Just as well I didn’t know, it would have spoiled my fun;
Actually, I bowled quite well- took 3 for 21.
What to do with all my gear? It mocks me ‘though I love it.
I’d better rack my brains to find a secret place to shove it.
My tidy wife is after it – “Get rid of it” she’ll say,
“You’ll never play again so why not chuck the stuff away.”
She’s right of course and what she says is only common sense,
But I am still a cricketer – in the present tense,
And I can still delude myself it isn’t ‘if but ‘when’
I’ll squeeze into my cricket togs and trot out once again.
But dreams are dreams and facts are facts, it’s likely that I shan’t,
And p’raps it’s better if I don’t – I might find out I can’t!
By Arthur Salway
The Speaker
Peter Walker, President of Glamorgan CCC
Douglas Miller introduced the speaker, saying it gave him great pleasure to introduce Peter Walker. He had approached Peter, as one President to another, begging the favour of him to come to speak at our lunch. The ground opposite was where Peter had played his last ever cricket match – at Bob Barber’s birthday party game in September 2005. Peter’s best performance with the bat was 152 not out and with the ball, 7 for 58, at Lord’s both in the same match in1962. He played Test Cricket for England 3 times in 1960 against South Africa, England winning all three.
From the internet: As a fielder, he ranks among the best of all time: he took 697 catches in 469 career matches, and his 73 catches in 1961 – to go alongside his 1000 runs and 100 wickets – is the third-highest figure for a fielder in a single English cricket season, after Walter Hammond and Mickey Stewart and the best ‘treble’ – runs, wickets and catches ever recorded in the history of the first-class game.
Read more … http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Walker_(cricketer)
Peter was not just a cricketer to be reckoned with, but much more than that. Bristol-born, he was taken to South Africa by his journalist father, who had a clandestine meeting with Nelson Mandela before he was incarcerated on Robben Island.
In later life, Peter too had a distinguished career as a journalist and for 18 years was the presenter of the John Player Sunday League programme on BBC 2.
Douglas had got to know Peter while writing a book on his Glamorgan teammate, Don Shepherd, and again on a Gullivers tour of Australia to coincide with Nasser Hussain’s Ashes tour in 2002/03. He then shared in running a careful editorial eye over Peter’s autobiography – ‘It’s Not Just Cricket’ a splendid book published by Stephen Chalke’s company, Fairfield Books. It was with great pleasure he handed the floor to Peter.
“Mr. President, Ladies, and Gentlemen thank you Douglas for your generous introduction. I have happy memories of him standing looking on at midnight with a slightly wrinkled nose as some of the Gulliver’s group enjoyed a ‘pie and sauce’ at an open-aired Cart outside Adelaide station. When pressed Douglas immediately became a convert. Douglas is a very important person in my life and is fond of teasing me about my grammar and punctuation!
It is a relief to speak today to a mixed audience. I was once asked to address the Women’s Institute in Wales at their AGM in Llandrindod Wells and arrived for pre-dinner drinks to find myself surrounded by 400 twin sets and pearls. Sitting at the top table, I was introduced, by the lady Chair, as someone who had started out with life in cricket and had become a well-known broadcaster in Wales. She rounded off her lengthy introduction with ‘Well ladies, when Mr. Peter Walker has finished addressing us, I know you will give him the clap which he so richly deserves!’ Take it from me that was a tough assignment to follow!
After dinner speaking can be fraught with the unexpected. At the Belfast Collegians CC’s all-male, black-tie dinner for 300 people, the Irish Toastmaster started to introduce the ‘two wonderful speakers we have this evening“ only to finish by saying that “Peter Walker will be first as “the other b—rd hasn’t turned up.”
As Douglas so rightly once described me as being ‘a journeyman cricketer’ I felt privileged to have been asked to come to the Bat & Ball ground, to all cricket lovers, the home of cricket. It’s been a long route.
I ran away to sea at 16 on a Swedish Tanker which was discharging a cargo of oil in Lourenzo Marques on the then Portuguese East Africa. At school in South Africa, I had been coached by Allan Watkins and as chance would have it the tanker was routed to Barry in South Wales for a repair, allowing me to go along to the last game of the County season to touch base with my former coach. As it was starting to rain Allan asked if I wanted to come to have a bowl in the nets. I jumped at the unexpected chance. The Cardiff Arms Park Indoor School was on the top floor of the now long demolished North Stand with a rubber mat and small, well-holed nets. After a short session of bowling and batting with Wilfred Wooller and Allan, Wilf asked if I fancied a summer contract? But for that lucky visit to see my former coach, I would not be here now!
You need luck in this life and my luck helped to get me to become a close to the wicket fielder. How I got to short leg illustrates this. After some good performances in the County 2nd Xl, I’d worked my way into the Glamorgan first team alongside Allan Watkins and Wilfred Wooller, and because I was the youngest on the field they sent me out to field at 3rd man. By the time Warwickshire was 280-3 I was so knackered that I had to leave 2 balls before the end of each over to be sure to make it the far side! As I passed captain Wilf and their skipper I asked him where he wanted me to go and he responded ‘for C—–’s sake, spit in the air and go where it lands! Doing as I was told I did so. It fell at short square leg. Two balls later I caught an inside edge from the batsman and as a result, spent the next 18 years almost always in that position!
As I said, you need luck and I have been lucky enough to play with a lot of incredible characters. Fred Trueman – there was no better bowler than when he was trying at the County level. But if he felt the pitch was unhelpful, he tended not to bother too much….. Some 25 years after I retired and while I was recovering from a major operation Fred rang with a brief, “How are you lad?” in his typical broad Yorkshire accent. Twenty-five minutes later and with me in this period doing no more than in reply asking him how he was, I was virtually silent before came, “‘take care lad” – and he put the phone down!
There was only one person at other counties I had reservations about – Geoffrey Boycott – arguably the most selfish man in the period I played We were about to play Yorkshire at Headingley and before the start, both teams were warming up, side by side on the outfield. Yorkshire had lost the majority of their games, even though Geoffrey was averaging over 70. Talking to Yorkshire’s Chris Old alongside me, I asked where Annie, Geoffrey’s girlfriend was – her normal seat alongside the changing rooms was empty. “She’s left him,” said Chris “Why,” I asked? “Because he won’t do to her what he’s doing to Yorkshire Cricket!” Years later, when a long time retired, ‘Boycs’ was on trial in Marseilles for allegedly roughing up his then partner who had thrown his clothing and shoes out of their 2nd-floor room. The lady judge politely, if sardonically, asked if Mr. Boycott had been wearing his shoes at the time?
Derek Randall was another great character. En route to the Centenary Test Match at Melbourne, the England team played a warm-up game in Madras, captained by Tony Greig. He and Derek decided to have a round of golf after lunch which included a red hot vindaloo Madras curry. On the fairway of the 3d hole Derek, dying to go to the loo, asked his playing partner if he had any toilet paper? “No”, came Greig’s reply. “Any newspaper then?” said Derek. Again a yell of “of course not”. Quick as a flash Derek cheekily, in a high-pitched voice, enquired, “Any chance of a fiver then Greggie?”
Cricket fans often ask who was the quickest bowler you ever faced. To me, there is only one name – Frank Tyson!. How quick? Well, next time you’re on the platform of a railway station with a 125 train due to pass through without stopping…..stand as close to the edge as you dare – ‘WOOSH’ you can hear it passing you. It was the same facing Frank just 16 or so yards away at the point of release! One-fifth of a second one had to hit the ball – or, more ominously, it hit you!
These days we play on such bland pitches – to me, quality batting skills came from playing on uncovered pitches. I’d love to see how Kevin Pietersen would fare on those surfaces.
After my cricketing career ended, in 1972, I presented the John Player Sunday League on BBC2 for eighteen years working with two splendid commentators. Jim Laker was a somewhat taciturn and dour Yorkshireman who often did the first session. At one match, at Tewkesbury, I had read up about the War of the Roses and the abbey and got a bit carried away. Having read out and analysed the two teams, I finished my introduction as the bowler started to run into bowl the first ball of the match. I handed over to Jim Laker. Jim said “thank you, Peter, you’ve said everything” – and uttered not another word for 12 minutes! Lesson learned – never upstage the front man. Thankfully he later forgave me and became a very close friend and supporter.
Before a game, John Arlott would never have lunch with the production team. He preferred to bring his own – 2 bottles of claret and a variety of cheese and biscuits. I tentatively asked him if he didn’t feel slightly tongued before doing his commentary. He responded with a wry smile, “Not at all, Peter and by the way, I do like a drop of white too”.
The modern game is much more athletic than in my day. Batsmen now average over 40. Graveney, May, Cowdrey, Barrington, Dexter, et al, on uncovered pitches, only managed in the upper 30s. Change for the better? I think not. These days players from opposing sides rarely mix. After play on the first two days in my era, we always had a drink with the opposition – great for bonding. It was a type of freemasonry; the professional was a game played in the Corinthian spirit.
After retiring in 1972 I’ve been lucky enough to make a living outside the game and enjoyed countless humorous moments. When I worked for BBC Wales TV on the nightly news programme ‘Wales Today’ we would have a preview programme on the Friday, and a post-mortem on Monday. I ignored Wrexham AFC most of the time and received regular letters from a woman in those parts asking why I was bypassing the efforts of her club, Wrexham. I used to respond with the standard BBC letter of apology but continued. This went on for 4-5 weeks and then stopped. Then came a letter, in her handwriting, addressed to the Controller of BBC Wales – the top man! She’d written a four-page tirade against my South Wales bias, finishing with a phrase I might well use as my epitaph… the continued employment of this man was robbing some village of its idiot!”
I always prefer to come to this sort of do – the grassroots of cricket. However, I am here by default because you should really have been listening to someone wearing high heels and a skirt – England’s former lady captain, Clare Connor OBE!
Despite your disappointment, Douglas Miller is a splendid man, a worthy President of your famous club and in consequence, I’ve so enjoyed being with you this afternoon – or is it already evening?
Douglas Miller’s vote of thanks
We are still awaiting a response from Clare Connor, but we’re really glad she didn’t! We could not have wished for a better speaker! Thank you, Peter.
Douglas Miller Appeal
Douglas raised an appeal on behalf of the Monks Risborough Cricket Club whose pavilion had been burned to the ground and as their insurance was being renegotiated at the time, was not insured. The Bedser twins had earned their first match fee there.
Next Meeting
The next lunch will be on Saturday, 2 October 2010.