Lives in Cricket No 52 - Schooled in Cricket (2nd edition)

138 who contributed in 1966 besides the developing local Lincolnshire talent. McVicker, Evans and Lawrence shared the bowling prize – though Johnny had the best average of the three. Johnny is still the oldest player in the world to have played a ‘grade A’ (that is, top class) limited overs match, when he played against Hampshire in the 60-over Gillette Cup – the knock-out cup of the day on May 5, 1966 at the (then) County Ground, Northlands Road, Southampton. This was the first time that Lincolnshire had qualified to play in the Gillette Cup and thus were able to sample the top grade of one-day cricket. Hampshire still had many of the players who had helped them win the county championship in 1961. Their Antiguan middle-order batsman, Danny Livingstone, one of that ‘61 side, was to score 92 and win ‘Man of the Match’. Lincolnshire had acquitted themselves well though the match was not a personal success for Johnny who failed to take a wicket. Although Lincolnshire lost the match they were obviously – from their performance – a much more competitive outfit than perhaps ever in their previous history and certainly in the context of the match 31 runs was not a great margin of defeat. It was not until 1974 that Lincolnshire would go on and beat a first-class county, Glamorgan, in this competition and though Johnny had long since finished playing for the county, his influence had been handed down, and it was fitting that it was a player enormously influenced by Johnny, Martin Maslin, who was to win man of the match on that occasion. We know – from a letter concerning his renewal of contract for a further three years from 1960 – that at this time he continued to receive £11 per match plus travelling and hotel expenses. In 1966, Johnny had a benefit with Lincolnshire which raised over £300. This may seem a small amount, but professionals had to take what they could get and this was probably as much as he might have hoped for. As with his benefit at Somerset so at Lincolnshire, he The Lincolnshire link – a further decade in a different form of county cricket