Today cricket historian James Wilson looks at the history of women’s cricket and explains why Clare Connor’s appointment as MCC President is really good news. “Ladies playing cricket — absurd. Just like a man trying to knit.” Sir Len Hutton “Sod off you sexist git” Unnamed woman cricketer History has been made during lockdown by the Marylebone Cricket Club, with the appointment of its first female president, Clare Connor. Connor’s cricketing credentials are impeccable, with over 100...
What’s In A Test?
Today we’re joined again by James Wilson author of Court and Bowled: Tales of Cricket and the Law. Alan Jones fans won’t be happy with this. Ahem. Crossing swords – or Gray-Nicolls – with David Gower is not something I ever envisaged when I started following cricket, or even when I started writing about it in earnest. It is certainly not something the seasoned hack, let alone the amateur scribe, ought to attempt lightly if at all. I have never faced Clive Lloyd’s deadly fast...
The Test Documentary – A Review
Today we welcome back James Wilson, author of Court and Bowled: Tales of Cricket and the Law (WSH, 2017). Here’s his review of Amazon Prime’s documentary on Australia’s post sandpaper-gate resurgence. I have just finished binge-watching The Test, the fly-on-the-wall documentary about Australian cricket’s travails from shortly after the sandpaper affair of March 2018 until the successful retention of the Ashes in England in late 2019. I imagine it has been staple fare for all...
The Debutants
Today we welcome back James Wilson, author of Court and Bowled: Tales of Cricket and the Law. He recalls some of the more interesting Test debuts experienced by cricketers over the years. Enjoy … The vast majority of cricketing followers, myself included, needless to say, will never come close to playing first class cricket, let alone test cricket. We can only imagine what it feels like to walk out to face the ultimate examination of one’s cricketing ability and character. We will never...
The Slows
England’s failure in the 2019 Ashes was due partially to the immovable object that was Steve Smith, but equally to the calamity that was its own top order, who had lost a few matches before the Ashes and nearly embarrassed them very badly against Ireland. The problem at root (with the exception of Root) was the lost art of test batting. Hence I thought it pertinent to recall a few players from years past who could have taught the current lot a thing or two about survival at the crease. During...
The Boundaries Scored Controversy: The Greatest Game, But Not The Greatest Rules
James Wilson, New Zealand supporter and author of Court and Bowled: Tales of Cricket and the Law, is back. Here’s his take on that controversial 2019 Cricket World Cup final in which boundaries scored decided the outcome. Twenty years ago, Australia and South Africa played what was then widely acclaimed as the greatest one day international of all time, when they tied in the semi-final of the 1999 World Cup. There were several reasons for the match being given that accolade: the...
