Lives in Cricket No 30 - MJK Smith

47 Chapter Six A golden summer Mike’s winters were spent at Edgbaston pursuing his duties as Assistant Secretary. ‘I’d have to think deeply,’ he replies when asked what he actually did in this capacity. Warwickshire were fortunate to have one of the best secretaries in the country, Leslie Deakins, and there was little pretence that Mike’s job was other than a way of retaining him as a player and preserving his amateur status. Deakins was a man of whom Mike speaks with real affection and respect. Starting with the county as a teenager in 1928, he had grown up in the days when the ground was closed for the winter and business was conducted from rented offices in the middle of Birmingham. Shortly before the end of the war Deakins had been appointed Secretary, a post he held until ill- health hastened his retirement in 1975. By the time of Mike’s arrival Deakins had won over a stubborn majority on the committee who had seen all the dangers and few of the benefits of a football pool to be run by a supporters’ club. The money raised from the weekly shillings strengthened the county’s bid for Test cricket, later providing for the ground development that would consolidate Edgbaston’s status. Before long the pool was bringing in a surplus that could be offered to other causes, Essex receiving a loan to help purchase the Chelmsford ground. ‘It went off like a penny rocket,’ says Mike. Birmingham was well suited to this kind of fund-raising. Businessmen were happy to support the cause by allowing agents to earn commission in their bosses’ time, trawling the factory floors to gather in the weekly shillings from the workforce. At the peak of the enterprise, contributions were being collected from 750,000 people. An office run by Deakins could easily allow his assistant a few weeks away from his desk in the winter months. In January 1958 Mike had been to East Africa and the following winter he travelled to South America with an MCC party of amateurs under the captaincy of Hubert Doggart. Their Christmas was spent in Brazil, where four one- or two-day matches were played. Moving on to the Argentine, they played seven matches, two of which were