Somewhat late to this, Jon, but no less enjoyable for that.
A couple of thoughts: I think it’s a recognised phenomenon that the more you tell yourself not to say something the more likely you are to say it. I’ve certainly done that.
I saw Richards live (not 1976, but the 1979 WC final and the Gillette the same season), and I think Lara was better. The best batsman I’ve ever seen, and I tend to feel he doesn’t quite get his due. There’s the elegance, and the control, but also the sheer impregnability. I’ve sometimes felt watching Steve Smith or Joe Root that it’s unimaginable that they would ever get out, but nobody quite had that air like Lara. The winter after the 375 I was on Atherton’s tour in Australia and met a Yorkshireman who’d been in Antigua. He said that when Lara had about 20 he felt sure he was going to break the record. Sure enough, he did.
Having “seen Viv” is one of the great claims of our cricket-loving generation. I think that the game you mention from memory is the Gillette Cup Final against Northants, a few months after the ’79 WC Final – he scored 117, I was there too, heartbreaking but spectacular and never forgotten.
On the way home from playing yesterday I drove past Wellingborough School, a Northants outpost in the 70’s and 80’s, and thought, as ever, about the time, in a Sunday league game, that Viv hit the ball out of the ground, over the road and deep into the nearby Comprehensive. It’s a well told tale, maybe even exaggerated - I’ve even heard Graeme Swann mention it although, if I’m correct in dating it as 1978, it happened a year before he was born. Maybe he did it again?
Somewhat late to this, Jon, but no less enjoyable for that.
A couple of thoughts: I think it’s a recognised phenomenon that the more you tell yourself not to say something the more likely you are to say it. I’ve certainly done that.
I saw Richards live (not 1976, but the 1979 WC final and the Gillette the same season), and I think Lara was better. The best batsman I’ve ever seen, and I tend to feel he doesn’t quite get his due. There’s the elegance, and the control, but also the sheer impregnability. I’ve sometimes felt watching Steve Smith or Joe Root that it’s unimaginable that they would ever get out, but nobody quite had that air like Lara. The winter after the 375 I was on Atherton’s tour in Australia and met a Yorkshireman who’d been in Antigua. He said that when Lara had about 20 he felt sure he was going to break the record. Sure enough, he did.
Having “seen Viv” is one of the great claims of our cricket-loving generation. I think that the game you mention from memory is the Gillette Cup Final against Northants, a few months after the ’79 WC Final – he scored 117, I was there too, heartbreaking but spectacular and never forgotten.
On the way home from playing yesterday I drove past Wellingborough School, a Northants outpost in the 70’s and 80’s, and thought, as ever, about the time, in a Sunday league game, that Viv hit the ball out of the ground, over the road and deep into the nearby Comprehensive. It’s a well told tale, maybe even exaggerated - I’ve even heard Graeme Swann mention it although, if I’m correct in dating it as 1978, it happened a year before he was born. Maybe he did it again?
And Lords 1983, what a day!
I think you're right Tim, it must have been the Gilette Cup, and I would have sworn it was a few years later...