Cricket Witness No 5 - Whites on Green

85 Chapter Eleven Championship tricks and a victory over the Boks Wilf Wooller, the pre-war rugby international and amateur cricketer, had been amongst those to suffer at the hands of the Japanese whilst a Prisoner of War at various camps at Changhi. As sportsmen and women of the Swansea area dusted off their kit and got their equipment out of store, it seemed quite fitting that the burly all-rounder should be leading Glamorgan as the next chapter unfolded in the history of county cricket at St. Helen’s with Wooller leading Glamorgan to the County Championship title in only his second year in charge. It was Glamorgan’s first-ever title with Wooller’s team surprising what seemed like everyone outside Wales in winning the County Championship. Despite a few headshakes in the Home Counties following their decisive victory against Hampshire at Bournemouth in late August, it was not a fluke in 1948 and owed much to the strategy of Wooller, and the skills of his bowlers and fielders, with the latter forming a predatory ring close to the bat and building – in the case of Swansea – on the ground’s reputation as a place which helped the spinners. Wilf Wooller makes his way down the pavilion steps at Swansea with John Reid, the captain of the 1958 New Zealanders.