Lives in Cricket No 30 - MJK Smith

121 ‘Would you mind if I came back?’ It was a freak dismissal. Edwards had chased the previous ball down to the boundary, and he later admitted: ‘I was jogging back to my position when I looked up and there was Fergie already into his delivery stride. Mike Smith picked the delivery off his toes and the catch would have hit me in the chest if I had not caught it – but I was 20 or 25 yards out of position!’ ‘My silly fault,’ says Mike. ‘I should have noticed that he’d moved.’ There would be only 15 more wickets in Massie’s Test career, five of them in the next match at Trent Bridge, where Mike fell twice to his more illustrious partner Dennis Lillee, who had also claimed him in both innings at Old Trafford. His final dismissal in Test cricket, coming soon after Lillee had taken the new ball, perhaps summed up a career that had always had an Achilles heel. Giving the impression he had not sighted a full toss, he was hit on the pads and departed lbw ‘looking as though he had seen a ghost,’ The Times suggested. Scores of 17 and 15 in a match England did well to draw were not enough for Mike to retain his place. He had not been a failure – Boycott, Edrich, Luckhurst and Parfitt did no better than Mike in the five-match series – but, in his own words, ‘I’d not made enough runs. I have no complaints.’ His international career over, Mike could concentrate on helping Warwickshire in their challenge for the Championship, a title Alan Smith was determined to win. A young Alvin Kallicharran, capped for West Indies the previous winter, had become eligible to play, and wicketkeeper Deryck Murray, already qualified by residence, had also been signed, swelling the Caribbean contingent to an unprecedented four Test players. A first five of Amiss, Jameson, Kanhai, Mike and Kallicharran allowed the county to field five bowlers, which Alan Smith felt was essential on the flat Edgbaston pitches. With eight of their 20 matches still to play on Mike’s return from Trent Bridge, Warwickshire lay second, 16 points behind Gloucestershirewith a game inhand. After a four-wicketwin against Kent at Dartford, the weather intervened, severely curtailing play in the next two matches; but beating Nottinghamshire by nine wickets put the county’s title challenge back on track. Another victory by the same margin against Surrey at Edgbaston, coupled with Gloucestershire taking only three points after an over- cautious declaration against Somerset, meant that Warwickshire were all but crowned with three matches still to be played. The title was eventually theirs by a margin of 36 points. Mike’s runs may have been in short supply in the Tests, but for his county he