Famous Cricketers No 65 - Len Hutton

Foreword By Mr. T. W. Graveney OBE distinguished former England Test batsman Len Hutton was a master batsman and, with due respect to others, the finest opener of all in English cricket. I was fortunate enough to play with and against him from 1948 until he retired. When I hear people talk about Len now I am always surprised that they seem to look upon him as a mainly defensive player, which he certainly wasn’t. He was a beautiful stroke maker and could score as fast as anyone if the situation demanded it, even on turning pitches. The way he picked out the gap in the covers was an education to me. I remember talking to him one day and he said that he was a better player before the war – I couldn’t see how he could have got any better! The most difficult thing Len had to do was when he was made captain of England and his first trip was to the West Indies. There was no doubt that some people at the MCC and the press did not want a professional as captain and this attitude got worse after we lost the first two Tests. Len let his bat do the talking and the series was shared after he scored 169 in British Guiana and 205 in Jamaica. Len never did much talking and he was basically a steady, sound captain who did things in his own way. I suspect the greatest pleasure he had as a skipper was having Tyson and Statham on hand to return the fire that he had had to endure at the hands of Ray Lindwall and Keith Miller – I reckon he really enjoyed that. Going back to Len saying that he was a better player before the war, this was probably due to his injury when he broke his arm. I recall going to Scarborough at the end of the season when he had scored a lot of runs and confessing he was a little bit tired. In the three matches we played he scored a century in each one using a Harrow bat! That is how good Sir Leonard was and it was an honour to play with such a man. 3