Although he won’t come out and say so some of us at CricketWeb suspect Martin believes that James Vince’s first Ashes trip is going to be reminiscent of Tip Foster’s memorable visit to Australia in 1903. Why else would he choose now to write about the man who still holds the record for the highest Test score by an Englishman in Australia?
With Archie’s review this week is being of a distinctly mainstream title Martin has dug out something for the hardcore cricketing bibliophile. Surely there can be no other sport where such a good book can be written about the life of a man of such modest achievements?
John Reid first played for New Zealand more than 68 years ago and is his country’s oldest surviving Test cricketer – he is also one of their very best, and in this feature Martin tells his story
The quality is so high this year that the Review team may need to be sent overseas again in order to deliberate on our Book of the Year – according to Martin the Maldives are very relaxing in December
We haven’t reviewed many books about club cricket, and probably won’t be looking at too many more in the future, but there are plenty around so it is not a subject we can ignore
……. and of course it would be a great surprise if, when in such a mood, Martin did not present us with a review of something on the theme of Lancashire cricket
Over the years we have learned that sometimes it is best to indulge Martin and not ask too many questions on those occasions his choice of books for review is a little, shall we say, left field?
The 2017 English summer saw Kumar Sangakkara take his leave of the First Class game, and he certainly bowed out in style
It will come as no surprise to those who recall his review of Somerset Cricketers 1882-1914 that Martin didn’t wait very long before reading its sequel
In this feature Martin tells the story of Abdul Kardar, a powerful figure in the earliest days of Pakistan cricket