Lives in Cricket No 40 - Edwin Smith

61 none of us could take our eyes off it. Eventually, he stopped bothering with one. It was a golden summer and Derbyshire’s batsmen enjoyed themselves. Donald Carr scored 2165 runs, a Championship aggregate record for Derbyshire that still stands, while Arnold Hamer, at the age of 42, scored 1850. At last Laurie Johnson fulfilled the talent that everyone knew he had, with 1480 runs, while Charlie Lee and Derek Morgan also passed four figures. Laurie had first played in 1949, having come over from Barbados to train as a sugar engineer. He always looked a player of class, but for a long time struggled for runs on English wickets. In 1959 it all clicked, maybe because the wickets were similar to back home. He never looked back. A lot of people think that was a long apprenticeship, but he went to what was then British Guiana for three years to work on a sugar plantation. He only played one game of cricket in those three years, so when he came back here he was pretty much starting from scratch. What a player though! Once he got the measure of the English wickets his cover driving was typically Caribbean and very powerful, while his fielding at point was world-class. He had a bullet-like throw, which I suppose you would expect from someone who once held the junior world record for throwing a cricket ball! The previous summer, Johnson had scored only 693 runs in 50 Championship innings, with a highest of 49 and an average of 17. Yet Denis Smith rated him and for the next six summers he became the batting linchpin, whose aggressive play brought thousands of runs. For Edwin, the summer brought a welcome return to form. While Jackson again headed the averages with 132 wickets at 16, he had 79 at just under 27 runs each. Lancastrian Bob Berry had been specially registered before the season. A slow left-arm bowler, he had been forced out of his native county, then Worcestershire, by a surfeit of spinners, despite having twice played for England. He flighted the ball well, but a tendency to bowl loose deliveries meant he never became established. While the intention was for he and Edwin to make up a spin bowling partnership, Berry was generally out- bowled in the matches they played together, finishing the summer with just 17 Championship wickets at 45 runs each. Edwin bowled especially well in the win against Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge, with match figures of six for 92 from 51 overs. Five for 67 against the touring Indian side, traditionally fine players of spin bowling, underlined his credentials, as did an analysis of five for 32 that enabled a win over Hampshire at Derby. At Worthing, figures of six for 44 helped force another win and Edwin was now seen as a spin bowler of genuine, consistent ability. How does he A decade ends