NFR - RIP Alec

[CorkedHat]

Growing up in the fifties there were two sporting teams that I idolised.
There was, naturally, Fulham and John Norman Haynes and there was the Surrey Cricket Club.
Unlike Fulham, Surrey won everything and as a callous youth I used to sit in the wooden seats of The Oval and marvel at such players as John Edrich, Kenny Barrington ( my Johnny Haynes of cricket), Jim Laker, Tony Lock, Arthur McIntyre and so on.
A couple days ago one of those players from that great team, Alec Bedser, died and so another fragment of my memory is stowed away forever.
Here in Australia one of my close friends is a former Australian test cricketer, Ian Meckiff, and Ian used to say that Alec was the archetypical English gentleman.
Yes – he was a great man and a great bowler.
RIP Alec Bedser.

[Dragoman]

Ian Meckiff ? Wasn't he once accused of chucking ?

[epsomraver]

hear hear MR CH I went to the Bedser cricket school on Lavender Hill for a while which the brothers ran, sadly like top class football I wasn't good enough to get into the Surrey colts.

[CorkedHat]

Ian Meckiff ? Wasn't he once accused of chucking ?

Yes he was which was a great shame. He had to give up playing as a result.
There have been many worse than him who have got away with it. Ian played in the famous tied test against the mighty West Indies in 1960 and when they had a 40 years reunion ( in Brisbane) Ian was kind enough to invite me to meet such players as Kanhai, Sobers and Hall.

[TonyGilroy]

The Wikipedia entry on Ian Meckiff is lengthy and very interesting.

His action was somewhat unusual and in those days the technology did not exist to properly check it but he does seem to have been greatly sinned against rather than being the cheat that he was accused (by some) of being.

Harold Rhodes was the English version - a wonderful fast bowler who only played a couple of times for England and was intermittently no balled for throwing. Similar accusations were made against Charlie Griffith.

Bizzarely the umpire who effectively ended Meckiff's career was a friend who appears to have felt genuinely bad about no balling him and Meckiff seems not to have taken offence.

An interesting topic but a shame that the Alec Bedser obituary thread is being taken over.