Cricket Witness No 3 - The Daffodil Blooms

74 Restarting and regrouping the season with a five-wicket win at the Arms Park. But Johnnie and his men bounced back with a thrilling three-wicket victory in the second game of the 1946 season against Lancashire at Old Trafford and then, after draws with Northamptonshire at Swansea and Sussex at Newport, recorded an emphatic innings victory inside two days over Sussex at Horsham. The victory at the Horsham Festival followed a special event at the start of the contest which saw each team being introduced to “Monty” or, to give him his full title, Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery of El Alamein, who had commanded the Eighth Army in the Western Desert Campaign, and had been in charge of all Allied ground forces during Operation Overlord. Glamorgan’s players were delighted to meet the esteemed military leader, especially Wilf, who together with Johnnie and the other amateurs, also chatted at great length during the lunch interval to “Monty”. The captain-elect latter commented how he would have dearly loved to have spoken more to the great tactician, but for the fact that he had to return to the field. A full programme of Championship matches had been arranged for 1946, plus games at the Arms Park and Swansea against the Indian tourists over the Whitsun and August Bank Holidays. In essence, the calendar for the first summer of cricket during peacetime was a case of “business as usual” with the same model of fixtures from the late 1930s, but not all of the pre-war venues were ready for the resumption of county cricket. Whilst Rodney Parade in Newport, Ynysangharad Park in Pontypridd and Stradey Park in Llanelli had all been cleared of military trappings, The Gnoll in Neath was unavailable, and that led to Glamorgan adding Ebbw Vale to their lists of venues, with the Welfare Ground hosting the match against Worcestershire. Ebbw Vale had staged Minor County matches before the War and, reflecting the great interest in cricket in the area, a crowd in excess of 5,000 watched the first day of the match with Worcestershire. The Glamorgan officials were also impressed with the off-field arrangements, so much so that when, later in the season, the representatives from Llanelli CC reported that they would have difficulty in hosting the match with Nottinghamshire, there was little hesitation in switching the contest from Stradey Park to the Welfare Ground. Given their modest resources in terms of personnel, facilities and finances, it was truly remarkable that Glamorgan ended the