by David Lloyd
It meant I was off to fraternise with one of the best Australian teams of all time. It was to prove a deflating experience in the middle, but there were no such feelings for me off it. I would have to say that the Australians were a terrific set of blokes. Guys like Rod Marsh, Dennis Lillee, Jeff Thomson, the Chappell brothers, Ian and Greg, and the chain-smoking Dougie Walters – revered in his own country where he averaged a touch under 58, but not so effective overseas – were all great company.
It was this series of ferociously competitive cricket that taught me the value of the post-match beer. These days it is limited to the actual end of the match, or even the end of the series, dependent on the views of the respective captains and coaches, but back then it was something that took place at the end of every day’s play. Not everyone participated, of course, but the option was there to pop into the other team’s dressing room for a drink with blokes who had spent the past seven hours trying to knock your block off. Unfortunately, by the end of the tour, when it came to Test cricket my drink represented one for the road.
CHAPTER 8
Felled by a Cracker at the WACA
Some great sporting careers have been ended by injury. I would not claim either that my own career was great or that the particular injury that remains synonymous with my time in international cricket caused anything more than severe discomfort overnight and a swelling that unfortunately refused to stay – but the moment that Jeff Thomson poleaxed me with his cracker at the WACA was the one that told me I had scaled my peak. After that it was all about the descent.
It was mid-December 1974 and my Test life was only six months old, yet being helped from the field, forced to retire hurt, is what most people talk about when they recall my nine caps. I averaged over 40 and scored a double hundred, but I was not quite up to coping with what Australia hit us with during that winter. Neither, in fairness, were the majority of my battered and bruised team-mates.
In some ways, the blow I took to my particulars in Perth was self-inflicted, as I was not in any position to play the ball in question with any authority. You see, some injuries are directly related to others. For example, a back injury and hamstring trouble often go hand in hand. My problem during the 1974-75 Ashes – apart from struggling to see the 90 m.p.h. thunderbolts Thommo was launching, sometimes generously delivered from as far away as twenty-two yards – was that a bulging disc in my neck prevented me getting into my usual side-on position at the crease. Instead, my stance was contorted, and its open nature invited danger to the body if I made the slightest error in judgement.
Arguably, I shouldn’t have been playing because of this neck problem. But once you have got an England place you don’t relinquish it lightly, and after the frustration of missing the first Test at Brisbane due to a fractured finger there was little going to get in the way of me adding to my international appearances. I wanted to be out there feeling the heat – and how I felt it.
Recall this gladiatorial era of uncovered pitches when facing the planet’s best fast bowlers – such as West Indies’ awesome foursome of Malcolm Marshall, Andy Roberts, Michael Holding and Joel Garner – to get a picture of how intimidating life could be as a top-level opening batsman. It was a bit like break-dancing on the M25.
Of all the blows I ever took out in the middle, however, never was I in as much discomfort as that day during the second Test in Perth, when my genitals were returned to me after being found on the other side of what the manufacturers claimed was a protective box. Let’s run through some facts here: the litesome in question was pink and plastic when I needed something more befitting the Valyrian steel armour worn by combatants in Game of Thrones.
I might as well not have been sporting anything between my legs, for the good this so-called protector did on impact with the leather sphere hurled at breakneck speed by Thomson on Australia’s quickest and bounciest pitch, during an England second innings that began minus the injured Brian Luckhurst and in a match in which we were struggling to make the rampant hosts bat again. It was simply not fit for purpose. In fact, I’m not sure it would have stayed intact had you dropped an average-sized bar of soap on it in the washroom. Come to think of it, it looked awfully like those pink soap trays you used to get in pub toilets.
Nowadays, batsmen are much better protected around the groin, but this thing turned into a kind of medieval torture implement when it split. Full of breath holes, it splintered into several shards and rearranged itself around my orchestra stalls. The initial pain struck me as the ball hit the bullseye, a nanosecond before it clamped its plasticky jaws around my tackle. No wonder that I sank to my knees and jack-knifed straight onto my head in the most extreme pain. Just thinking about the moment makes my voice ascend an octave or two.
Thankfully, Bernard Thomas, our tour physio, was soon on the scene to assess things. Now looking a chap’s nether regions was not the kind of task he had signed up for, I’m sure, but boy was I glad for his handling of a delicate situation. Imagine a cactus growing the wrong way out of its pot. Apologies if that was too graphic, but it’s the best description I can provide of the landscape when, once I had been helped from the field, my trousers were removed in the dressing room.
All this because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time – for the particular delivery in question rather than my location I mean, although some might suggest the wrong place on both counts. I simply got myself too square-on and immediately knew there was trouble looming as I prodded lamely down the wrong line. Without doubt the ball would have passed above stump level, but unfortunately it wasn’t given the chance as it clattered into muggins here.
That pain in the neck – which had plagued me for the much of the tour and got worse towards the end after I damaged two vertebrae taking evasive action at short leg when Bob Willis was bowling against New South Wales, ruling me out of the sixth and final Test – had led to more pain elsewhere. To show how much the game has moved on, there were no chestguards, armguards or double thigh pads, just a rolled-up magazine or an old pair of socks shoved down your trousers if you felt extra padding was necessary. Ducking and swaying were essential to survival, but I had lost some of the agility necessary.
Being struck amidships is not something you forget. There are few things that leave me completely speechless but that is one of them, and there was nothing I suffered in my cricketing career to compare to that blow from Thommo. Mike Selvey, who was brisk rather than rapid among the fast-bowling fraternity, did double me over in a county match at Lord’s once by shaping one back into me. Concerned he might be fretting over my well-being post play, I considered the most responsible course of action to be a visit to the Middlesex dressing room to put his mind at rest. ‘Don’t worry, Selve,’ I grinned. ‘Compared to Thommo, you were a pleasure.’
You know as an England opener in Australia that you’re going to cop some, and the crowds can turn pretty vociferous when aroused. They like to see their Poms barbecued medium rare, and during the Perth Test when I was batting alongside the recalled 41-year-old Colin Cowdrey the crowd-baiting turned to applause for every over we survived. Of course, it was laced with sarcasm. It wasn’t support for our efforts. Sadistically, they just wanted to prolong the misery.
During the first innings of that match, we were fairly well placed at 99 for one before the rot set in. Cowdrey, who had been flown out in an emergency (following my fielding practice-induced finger break as well as John Edrich and Dennis Amiss being crocked at the Gabba), became my room-mate and we were reunited for over an hour, repelling over after eight-ball over in stultifying conditions. However, when the pitches gave Lillee and Thomson any kind of encouragement they proved an awesome pairing, and once we were parted the team plunged from a decent-looking position to 208 all out.
The hellish demands their speed and bounce placed on you stopped short of frightening, but it made you extremely wary, particularly when facing someone as rapid as Thommo. The Australian tactic of targeting the body of batsmen was reminiscent of Bod
yline, but all well within the laws and therefore a decent one.
The hairs stood up on the back of your neck walking to the crease anticipating a serious ‘do’ from them, and the exaggerated lift that a Perth pitch offered – it has always been a venue where batsmen have been able to leave on length on off-stump – made life uncomfortable when the ball was straighter, and there were plenty of bumpers, as Cowdrey was so fond of calling them.
Although I was not overly prolific on my return to the side, in my defence there were very few scoring opportunities against a backdrop of chin music, and in addition to top-scoring with 49 in the first innings, the six hours seven minutes I remained at the crease across the match was longer than anybody else managed.
I had spent another hour or so in the company of Colin, the equivalent of cricket royalty, after we marched out as new opening partners trying to erode a 273-run deficit on first innings. Days shy of his forty-second birthday he may have been and twenty years since he made his England debut, but there was still a touch of class about him. He turned up on the tour looking rather lavish in a pinstripe suit, every inch the archetypal gentleman. He even smiled at the young autograph hunter who verbally abused him at the end of a day’s play. ‘Marvellous,’ he said, signing the lad’s book, showing the unflappable nature and restraint we all needed to imitate in the face of such provocation.
On arriving in the middle for this WACA warfare, Cowdrey introduced himself: ‘Mr Thomson, I believe. How good to meet you.’ The reply he got was rather uncouth, comprising the words ‘piss off’ and ‘fatso’, befitting the image of an archetypal Aussie hoodlum.
But Colin lived to a certain standard and was not one to let those standards drop. I had found that out to my cost as a young Lancashire player some seven years earlier during a County Championship match against Kent. Back in that era, county teams did not always travel with a twelfth man in tow to away matches. So in instances of injury, a substitute fielder was borrowed from the home team at a cost of a pound. That was the equivalent of doing a day’s overtime for very little effort and therefore not to be sniffed at. In the majority of cases, you stood a bit like a statue at mid-on and mid-off. Unfortunately, however, this was exactly what I did when Kent came to Southport for a County Championship match in 1967. Summoned on to the field for what was a relatively short passage of play, I promptly dropped two catches – one in each position.
‘Tell me about your twelfth man,’ Cowdrey diplomatically said to Statham later that evening. ‘What exactly is his role in the game?’
My role in this second Test match had been to remain in unison with him as long as possible, but we were separated with the score on 52 by my tickle on the tackle. Colin was dismissed soon afterwards, and so when I returned to the crease early next morning at 106 for two it was Mike Denness, the captain, that I resumed alongside.
I could cope with the anticipated pantomime jeers and showed some determination to outlast Denness and another couple of partners until I was sixth out. But there was a limit to what I could contribute to the total due to the discomfort from my existing ailment, which required treatment before just about every match on that tour. It undoubtedly handicapped my strokeplay because my head was set in a crooked position, and standing almost chest on meant that I effectively closed off the off-side, negating the majority of shots on that side of the wicket.
It was very hard to turn at the crease and I was frustrated and angry that I couldn’t actually do what I wanted to do with a bat in my hand. So, although the blow I took in Perth was well documented, an equally significant one had been dealt to my ego.
The reality was that despite a couple of fighting 40s I never made it to a half century, and numbers are the proof of your quality at the highest level. While never the kind of batsman to take an opposition apart, even in my most carefree days, had I been able to grind out a hundred against this top-class attack, I would have made a case for retention beyond that winter. Instead, that tour dished out the harsh reality that despite my best efforts my career as a Test player was in jeopardy of being terminated sooner rather than later.
Having failed to convert my opportunities, albeit in the toughest environment of all, it offered others their shot. I guess for the short time I had my own spot in it – often wedged in the dressing room between like-minded fellows such as Bob Willis and Mike Hendrick – Boycott was the elephant in the dressing room for me, even though it would be a while before he returned to the England side.
Confirmation that I’d be going on the trip came in official correspondence from the Test and County Cricket Board, penned by Donald Carr, in late August. At that stage, I did not even possess a passport. All the paraphernalia for the tour followed in one leather cricket bag: the England tour blazer, MCC cap and sweater, shirts and trousers all tucked inside. When we landed in Australia we arrived in a cloud of smoke. Do not misconstrue this and imagine sixteen prize fighters sauntering down the runway steps in a boxing-style walk-on. It was just that in those days long-haul flights were dotted with folk with fags hanging out their mouths.
It made me chuckle when I saw an Instagram photo posted by Kevin Pietersen when he returned from Australia’s Big Bash League in February 2015 – he had pulled back his eye mask and taken a selfie on what appeared to be one of those reclining beds, surrounded by personal gadgets, no doubt with click-your-fingers waitress service thrown in. The only luxury we could expect shoved at the back of the big bird in economy would have been some cough mixture to counter the spluttering and wheezing. Upon arrival we had to make do with very basic accommodation, two to a room, with hotel gyms and splash pools not even a twinkle in that other David Lloyd’s eye.
The previous England team that had travelled to Australia in 1970-71, under the captaincy of Ray Illingworth, had returned victorious, of course, a truly historic win for an England team down under. John Snow was a key figure in that victory, and he had really riled the Australians with his refusal to back down in any contest. Unfortunately, this time he was not in our party.
From the moment we arrived, Australia were determined to show they were the better team and that they would avenge that defeat by Illingworth and Co four years earlier. And it is fair to say that we were caught on the hop by a combination of their initial Test line-up and an overwhelmingly comfortable warm-up period on the pitch, incorporating two wins and two draws against the state sides ahead of the first Test.
Despite this, there were problems. We landed in Australia in late October 1974, and were involved in four four-day games between 1 and 25 November. Given all the travelling logistics such a huge country provides, this was a gruelling schedule, and it was made especially so for our bowlers, who were not accustomed to bowling eight-ball overs.
Four decades on, armed with high-energy drinks, diet and nutritional advice, and directed by strength and conditioning experts, an England touring party is light years ahead of where we were. There is no doubt we were a fit bunch, but had we been tested I’m sure we would all have been flirting with the danger zone when it came to hydration as we fielded or batted.
While we understood the need to get fluids on board, there was nothing like Gatorade (apologies for the product placement, other sports drinks are available but come less readily to mind). Sure, we drank whenever there was a break in play, but what we drank was extraordinary by contemporary standards. It was called a brown cow. A brown cow, would you believe, was an intriguing mixture of Coca-Cola and milk. Meanwhile, back in county cricket, strength and conditioning would have amounted to an arm wrestle with your mates at the lunch table, while being careful not to knock over the beer bottles clumped in the middle – because for each home county match at Old Trafford, crates of Watney’s Red Barrel would be passed around.
Our kit wasn’t ideal, either. It was furnace hot and we were sporting these bloody great socks, made from thick wool that would have come in handy had Test cricket reached the Arctic Circle. The tour jumper was wool too – thick, cable knit. Not a thought
was given to the damage the sun could do us, either. We would go sunbathing on our rare days off, sleeves rolled up and shirts unbuttoned to top up tans; a few would cover their heads with sunhats, but others would be slapping on low-factor tanning oils, such was the world’s general ignorance when it came to skin cancer in that era.
Unsurprisingly, the tour physio Bernard Thomas had his work cut out. His daily duties included stretching the fast bowlers, which entailed the likes of Bob Willis and Mike Hendrick putting the back of one of their heels up on Bernard’s shoulder, and Bernard raising up on his toes to extend their hamstrings. This, of course, was more acceptable physical contact with one of the players than the incident in Perth when, during his examination of me, I pleaded with him: ‘Can you take the pain away but leave the swelling?’
I hope Bernard agreed a good overtime rate for that tour, as our chastening on-field experiences during that 4-1 defeat gave him plenty of work. It was a reprise of the bouncer war that Illy won on the previous tour. Things had not gone well for any of us, almost from the moment we landed in Darwin. Denness, our captain, suffered from pleurisy in the early days of the tour, and was absent for a few weeks while in recovery. Then, there was the range of injuries to contend with: my little finger broken in fielding practice, John Edrich broke a bone in his hand in the opening Test of six and later broke a rib in Sydney, while Dennis Amiss also fractured a finger in Brisbane.
What began as an adventure of a lifetime – a first foray overseas for yours truly – soon had the excitement sucked out of it. I had never been on a plane, other than a light aircraft flight over Blackpool on an early childhood holiday, so going on a trip like that was fairly daunting. The roar of the take-off was otherworldly and held an excitement all of its own.
Yet, for a cricketer with aspirations of an international career, there had been several moments to relish ahead of the epic journey, not least toddling off to the Stuart Surridge factory to select my two tour bats. When we got to Australia, we undertook all the usual tourist photos – posing, cuddling koalas under gum trees or in front of a family of kangaroos, or pretending to fish in Sydney Harbour.