Cricket Witness No 5 - Whites on Green

117 the visitors experimented with Bodyline bowling ahead of the winter tour to Australia: to Arlott’s delight Turnbull’s response was a fine double- hundred and a record stand with Dai Davies as the England bowlers were put to sword. As he later wrote, “the ultimate assessment of that innings is that Larwood eventually ceased to drop short or to bowl at his leg stump.” 7 After the War, Arlott succeeded George Orwell as the BBC’s producer of the weekly Book of Verse series for the Overseas Service. Through his work for the programme between 1945 and 1950, and his contact with poets, he developed a close friendship with Dylan Thomas, and as David Rayvern- Allen later wrote: “As country lads together in the smoke, Arlott and Thomas drank together, argued together, aspired and conspired together. With Celtic wives and family back in distant Hampshire and Carmarthenshire, there were times when they even shared a house together.” 8 Thomas loved cricket, as well as watching rugby, drinking beer, telling jokes and writing poetry. As Arlott later wrote, he was a delight to work with as a radio producer, not least because “he was a man with a voice that uttered poetry with the quality of a bugle note.” 9 John would always contact Dylan when he was posted by the BBC to commentate on Glamorgan’s matches. On one occasion when covering a game at the Arms Park, the pair met up after play and visited Tiger Bay, where they listened to, and were struck by, the potential of a young female singer called Shirley Bassey. But the pair were happiest when Glamorgan visited St. Helen’s, with Arlott writing how Thomas : “would turn up at county matches at Swansea, and curl up quietly in a corner of the commentary box, living it all through and then afterwards came away to one of the pubs or restaurants of his friends who received him so gladly. The evening invariably ended in sheer contentment, if not utter sobriety.” 10 It was from the commentary box on the roof-top at Swansea that Arlott penned the following, entitled “Cricket at Swansea: Glamorgan in the Field” , although it is interesting to speculate how many of these stanza’s originated from his good friend 11 : From the top of the hill-top pavilion, The sea is a cheat to the eye Where it secretly seeps into coastline Or fades in the fellow-grey sky, But the creasemarks are clear on the green As the axe’s first taste of the tree, And sharp is the Welshmen’s assault As the freshening fret from the sea. The ball is a withering weapon, Fraught with a strong-fingered spin And the fieldsmen, with fingers prehensile, Are the arms of attack moving in, For the catch is their new Cymric mission, Sixes at Swansea