Lives in Cricket No 14 - Jack Bond

people believed in you, the people that were actually controlling your lives. That did spur the pair of us on.’ By the end of the summer he had hit 1,701 runs in all matches with three centuries. In mid-August, against Sussex at Old Trafford, Jack reached three figures in 93 minutes. With a prize of £250 on offer from the Evening Standard for the fastest first-day century, his 106 included four sixes and outstripped his friend Collins, whose hundred against Gloucestershire only a week earlier had taken an hour and three quarters. Collins had insured himself against being overtaken for a modest premium of some £12 and was able to collect his money from the insurers, while Jack wondered if he should risk it as the season had only a couple of weeks to run. In the end caution won the day, but the insurers, having burnt their fingers once, asked him to pay £75. So his net profit was only £175, still enough to justify a celebration party after the last game, against Kent at Blackpool. ‘Kent are party animals,’ says Jack, ‘one or two mad people, so we had a heck of a good party at the Savoy Hotel where both teams were staying.’ Jack’s other hundreds came against Cambridge University and late in the season at Bath, when he hit 152 after Lancashire had conceded a first-innings lead of 202 to Somerset. Saving the match was Jack’s sole priority when he came in, but his later runs were harvested with greater ease once it became clear that there would be no declaration and wicket-keeper Harold Stephenson took his pads off to bowl. Lancashire’s problems multiplied in 1962, when Barber was replaced as captain by Joe Blackledge, a captain with no first-class experience, under whom the county plunged to sixteenth place in the Championship. But for Jack it was his most prolific summer. It started in April with a place in MCC’s side to take on Yorkshire, the champion county, at Lord’s. Though he made few runs on this occasion, Jack found in his new county captain a man who believed in him. Given a regular spot at number three, he was soon repaying his skipper’s faith. In the second match, at Derby, he played his part in a brave run-chase that was just thwarted when 14 were needed with Les Jackson to bowl the final over. Sixty-nine against Kent helped to secure first-innings points, then at Southampton his skipper’s declaration came with Jack still at the wicket on 96. ‘I hadn’t had any signal saying what was happening. He just clapped his hands and I walked in. He declared with quarter of an hour to ‘After all, it’s only a friendly match’ 37