Lives in Cricket No 40 - Edwin Smith

73 Family man fielder on the staff. For some reason Derek Morgan, who was skipper between 1965 and 1969, chose not to play me. He was a fine player but not so good as a captain, in my opinion. Nor was Ian Buxton, who replaced him. Perhaps I was spoiled under Guy Willatt and Donald Carr ... Had Edwin played more one-day cricket, what would have been his game plan? I would have bowled a full length from around the wicket and aimed at leg and middle. They would have had to take me on and cleared my long on, or swept me, when my mid wicket and deep square leg would come into play and there was a danger of leg before wicket, of course, if they missed. I’d have just bowled normal flight – no firing it in, just trying to beat them in the flight and hopefully getting them into bother if it turned. You see, most spinners today just roll it. When I started and throughout my career, you used to see spinners really tweak it between their fingers, the purchase affecting the amount of turn, of course. I didn’t try to turn every ball, but batsmen knew that I could turn it sharply and sometimes the thought of that was all it needed.