Remembering John Edrich – a brave cricketer
Before his death this week, Don Smith was the oldest living English Test cricketer. I remember him as a good opening bat and useful bowler for Sussex in the Fifties. Still, I’d forgotten that he was capped by England. His Test career was very short, three matches against the West Indies in 1957, and then he was discarded, having failed to reach 20 in his four or five innings. These days selectors would have been more patient. On the other hand, with today’s central contracts and the concept of an England squad, he might never have been called on at all.
The second half of the Fifties was quite like recent times in some sense. England were searching, somewhat haphazardly for reliable openers. Actually, they were doing that all through the decade, ever since Cyril Washbrook was discarded after the 1950-51 Ashes. Just as for years after Andrew Strauss’s retirement, England were seeking a partner for Alastair Cook. Until his retirement in 1955, they were searching for someone to open with Len Hutton. Several were called and tried: Jack Ikin, Frank Lowson, Reggie Simpson, David Sheppard, Don Kenyon, Bill Edrich (brought back by Len’s insistence in the 1953 Ashes – more of him later), Willie Watson, Trevor Bailey and Tom Graveney who made a century in Len’s last Ashes match.
With Len gone, it was experiment at both ends. Some players were successful: Worcester’s Peter Richardson, Lancashire’s Noddy Pullar and, for a couple of years the Northants captain Raman Subba Row. Colin Cowdrey was well-equipped for the job of opening and in fact made five or six of his twenty-two Test hundreds in that position. But he much preferred to bat at 3 or 4. So there was a constant coming and going, Don Smith being one who came and went very quickly. Brian Close was another who was tried (more than once) and discarded. Another was Gloucester’s Arthur Milton, the last man to play Test cricket and international football for England. Curiously Mike Smith – better known as M J K – the last to play Rugby and Cricket for England – opened in a couple of Tests, though he usually batted at four, five or six.
So, just like now, it was a long time before England found reliable openers. In John Edrich, first capped in 1963, and Geoff Boycott, who played his first Test the following year. They weren’t always paired – in Australia in 1965-6 Edrich batted at 3 while the dashing Bob Barber partnered Boycott. Indeed, Erich played almost as many Tests at first wicket-down as he did opening. So the pairing doesn’t have quite the ring of Hobbs and Sutcliffe, Hutton and Washbrook or, more recently Strauss and Trescothick, Strauss and Cook.
Sir Geoffrey is still with us, but John Edrich died just before Christmas, fondly remembered by – I should think – all who saw him play. Sir Geoffrey said he was the best partner he ever had. Like all openers he was quite often out caught by the wicketkeeper, but he was regarded as a master of the difficult art of leaving the ball, often withdrawing his bat at the last minute.
He wasn’t the most aesthetically pleasing of batsmen and there would have been days when he made big scores and you remembered few of his shots. Yet, he could score all round the wicket.
He was at his best against Australia, seven of his twelve Test centuries coming in Ashes matches. Few have scored more than that. He was very brave. In 1965, he suffered a heavy blow on the head against South Africa; no helmets then. When Lillee and Thomson destroyed England in the torrid tour, he had fingers fractured in one Test, ribs in another. In his last Test innings when he was in his fortieth year he and his opening partner Brian Close (aged 45) endured a ferocious barrage from the West Indian fast bowlers. Neither complained, though observers believed the umpires should have intervened.
The Edriches were a remarkable family. In the decade after the Hitler war, four Edrich brothers were playing county cricket. John was their much younger cousin. The best of the brothers was Bill, one of the generation of cricketers who lost seven years of their career to the war. Bill flew bombers over Germany and won the DFC. When he was thirty-nine or forty he was knocked out trying to hook Frank Tyson, the fastest bowler of his time. He spent the night in hospital but was back at the crease the next morning, hooking Tyson again. “It never hurts as much as you think it will,” he said.
Bill was a roisterer. A party during a Test against the West Indies in 1950 almost certainly cost him a place on the tour to Australia that winter; the captain Freddie Brown thinking him a disruptive influence and reputedly refusing to have him in the team. The young batsmen who were preferred all failed. His enthusiasm for cricket was such that he returned to the family’s native Norfolk and played Minor Counties cricket till he was sixty or near enough. Bill was my first cricket hero, till I deserted him for Len Hutton.
I doubt if you could name two more resolutely defiant batsmen than John and Bill Edrich.