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

189 Chapter Twenty-two Johnny’s most famous protege – Geoffrey Boycott Speaks Geoffrey Boycott told me: “John was perfect for youngsters. He was like everybody’s favourite granddad. He was a genuinely warm man who loved cricket. He made it fun; it was fun. His philosophy which I try to embody in my own coaching was: ‘Enjoy it – it’s the best time of your life. Smile’ and John always did make it fun. “He would engage you in technical things but he would never make it too complicated.” I tried to engage Mr Boycott about discussions and even disagreements he may have had about technique with Johnny. He prefered to put such questions to one side both with lack of memory and continual emphasis on the importance of encouragement as being more important than technique. We think of Boycott as a great technical batsman and he reflected that he had to have great technique to learn the game especially at a time when wickets were still uncovered. But the key – as he told me – was ‘never to be a hostage to technique’ and the Lawrence method while it incorporated the best of orthodox batting principles was precisely this practical philosophy. Boycott has described in detail in his autobiography in 1984 how he came by the nets at a time when his family was poor and a collective family effort was required to enable him to afford the nets at all. I make no apology for quoting the relevant narrative from this work in full as it illustrates several themes which apply to many other attenders of the school and describes well both the time period and the value of Johnny’s coaching. “[Uncle] Algy was a friend of Desmond Barrick ... whose