County Cricket Matters Issue 24
Martin Chandler |Published: 2025
Pages: 38
Author: Chave, Annie (Editor)
Publisher: County Cricket Matters
Rating: 5 stars
The end of another county season approaches and County Cricket Matters marks the occasion for the sixth time. As Annie points out in her editorial it has been a fine summer of county cricket, and a financial bonus from The Hundred is on its way to the counties’ coffers. We should enjoy things as they are while we can however as Annie explains why the county game is still in danger. It is reassuring to know that nothing gets past the lady in whom all who love the county game put their faith to present our case.
As always CCM 24 begins with Annie’s interview and this time her guest is the former Middlesex, Kent and England pace bowler Dean Headley who, coming from such a famous cricketing family and himself having had such a promising career cut short by injury, has much of interest to discuss. I may be alone in this, so it may just be a personal foible, but for some reason I do struggle to accept that those whose careers are cut short by injury still age. Headley is 55 now, yet in my mind’s eye he is still a young man waiting for the medical breakthrough that will salvage his playing career.
For those of us of a certain age Sir Geoffrey Boycott has loomed large in English cricket throughout our lives. Now well into his eighties Boycott has become something akin to a national treasure in recent years. He can be and often is accused of many things, some not without cause, but one thing he undoubtedly is is generous with his time.
Which brings me on to my favourite contribution to CCM 24, Matt Appleby’s look back on a lifetime following Boycott and, recently, having the opportunity to talk to him directly. Since his playing career ended, and with it the single-minded pursuit of runs, has come a slightly different Boycott. Still trenchant, opinionated and never dull he has never been anything other than well worth listening to. He may have mellowed just a little with age, but not very much.
An England contemporary of Boycott, and a man with a very different character and disposition was the Kent left arm spinner Derek Underwood. Despite those differences ‘Deadly’ shared Boycott’s determined pursuit of cricketing excellence and Paddy Briggs’ essay about him, written from the standpoint of a long time personal friendship, is also a very rewarding read.
And if advancing age is becoming a theme (although I had better be careful as I think I have established in the past that both Andrew Radd and Jeremy Lonsdale are younger than I am) then their conversation (which is what it is despite being set out in the form of an interview) is a fascinating one. Radd is steeped in Northamptonshire cricket as historian, writer and commentator. What I certainly didn’t know about him was that he is the son of an actor who, I discovered on checking, played a number roles in television dramas that I well remember from my youth.
Whilst on the subject of my youth John Winter provides CCM readers with Decision Day at Darley Dale. It is effectively an excerpt from his recent monograph on the 1975 John Player League campaign, written from a Hampshire perspective. The title was clinched when Hampshire beat Derbyshire in what remains the only county cricket match ever played at the ground in Darley Dale.
Which leaves four more articles all, as ever, on a varied selection of topics. The longest is Bill and Chris’s Excellent adventure from Chris Fauske. It is the story of three men meeting at York last summer to watch the ground host only its second First Class fixture in more than 150 years. For one of the three the journey to the ground was from Nottingham, but for Fauske himself and an American friend known only as The Commissioner, transatlantic travel was necessary.
The match was, for a while, competitive but after a collapse in their second innings Essex ended up losing by ten wickets. But the story isn’t really of the match itself but of the experience of three friends watching a four day County Championship fixture at an outground, with a number of additional entertaining and occasionally thought provoking asides from The Commissioner.
Mainland Europe is not ignored in CCM 24. Its first appearance is in the form of The Lure of the Pure by Kate Holdsworth. It was back in the 1970s that Kate’s mother taught her how to score and despite living in the Netherlands for what would appear to be more than two decades she now scores for BBC Yorkshire. Unsurprisingly the story of her journey in scoring is well worth reading.
Yorkshire also features in The Balloon of the Century by David Pendleton. It is not a long piece, but tells of the travels of a balloon that was part of the celebrations for the 150th anniversary of Scarborough Cricket Club in 1999. A short while later the balloon turned up on a beach on the island of Amrun, a German island in the North Sea and the finder, a young girl, made contact with the club.
And finally, the traditional testing crossword apart, is a moving contribution from Arunabha Sengupta. It begins with a confession, Arun telling of an occasion when, fielding in the outfield with a close friend at the crease on 48* he chose to fumble a skyer to get the batsman to his half century. From there Arun tells the story of the history of what was clearly an important friendship to him until, only towards the close of his piece does the purpose of the story become apparent. It is a heartfelt obituary of a man who, this time, Arun had no means of helping to his half century.
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