Fred Trueman book on Cricket Society-MCC Book of the Year shortlist

An starkly honest biography and an elegant romantic novel are among five titles short listed for the Cricket Society and MCC Cricket Book of the Year award for 2012.

Fred Trueman: The Authorised Biography wins well deserved recognition for Chris Waters, cricket correspondent of the Yorkshire Post, who set about assessing the Yorkshire and England fast bowler’s life with the blessing and co-operation of family members yet managed to deliver an objective account that and does not always find in his subject’s favour.

The judging panel headed by Vic Marks, the former Somerset and England player who followed Trueman into the Test Match Special commentary box at the end of his career, will announce their choice in the Long Room at Lord’s on April 16.

The five contenders -- sifted from a field of 24 -- also include a nicely crafted biography of the former Warwickshire captain Frank Foster , a fascinating but ultimately tragic character who has a right to be seen as his county’s greatest player, in the opinion of author Robert Brooke.

Foster, whose career was curtailed by the Great War and did not resume following a motorcycle accident in 1915, played in the Triangular Tournament that brought together England, South Africa and Australia in the Test series of 1912 and is the subject of Patrick Ferriday’s Before the Lights Went Out, which also impressed the panel enough to make the cut.

The same period, subsequently recalled as cricket’s ‘golden age’, forms the backdrop to the work of fiction among the contenders, the novel Half of the Human Race by Anthony Quinn, whose unlikely imagined romance between a gentleman cricketer and a suffragette creates an evocative and insightful portrayal of a cosily complacent, conservative England -- of which cricket is a microcosm -- threatened by a revolution of unexpected origins.

The quintet is completed by Australia - Story of a Cricket Country, a collection of essays and articles assembled by Christian Ryan -- whose biography of Kim Hughes, Golden Boy, was best cricket book at the British Sports Book Awards in 2010 -- to tell not only the history of Australia’s cricketing success but the way in which the game helped shape that country’s character.

The five books on the shortlist:

(Click on the links for more information)

F.R.Foster: The Fields Were Sudden Bare, by Robert Brooke (ACS Publications).

Before the Lights Went Out: The 1912 Triangular Tournament, by Patrick Ferriday (Von Krumm Publishing).

Half of the Human Race, by Anthony Quinn (Jonathan Cape).

Australia - Story of a Cricket Country, by Christian Ryan (Hardie Grant Books).

Fred Trueman: The Authorised Biography, by Chris Waters (Aurum).

The 19 that missed out:

Britain's Lost Cricket Grounds, by Chris Arnot (Aurum).

The Cambridge Companion to Cricket, edited by Anthony Bateman and Jeffrey Hill (Cambridge University Press).

A Class Act; Walter Read, The Surrey Champion, by Keith Booth (ACS).

Cricket at the Crossroads: Class, Colour and Controversy from 1967 to 1977, by Guy Fraser-Simpson (Elliott and Thompson).

Higgy - Matches, Microphones, and MS, by Alastair Hignell (A&C Black).

Australian Autopsy, by Jarrod Kimber (Pitch Publishing).

Jack Hobbs: England's Greatest Cricketer, by Leo McInstry  (Yellow Jersey Press).

Not Out First Ball, by Roger Morgan-Grenville and Richard Perkins (Bikeshed Books).

Twirlymen: The Unlikely History of Cricket's Greatest Spin Bowlers, by Amol Rajan (Yellow Jersey).

The Last Flannelled Fool, by Michael Simkins (Ebury).

The Following Game, by Jonathan Smith (Peridot Press).

The Breaks are Off: My Autobiography, by Graeme Swann (Hodder & Stoughton).

Tony Greig: A Reappraisal of English Cricket's Most Controversial Captain, by David Tossell (Pitch).

Twentieth Century All-Rounder, by Clive van Ryneveld (Pretext Publishers).

Arthur Milton: Last of the Double Internationals, by Mike Vockins (Methuen).

Ian Botham: The Power and the Glory, by Simon Wilde (Simon & Schuster).

Cricket and Broadcasting , by Jack Williams (Manchester University Press).

Behind the Boundary: Cricket at a Crossroads, by Graeme Wright (A&C Black).

Cricket's Historians, by Peter Wynne-Thomas (ACS).

All 24 books were nominated by either Cricket Society or MCC Members and not publishers. Marks and fellow judges David Kynaston and Stephen Fay, representing MCC, and John Symons and Chris Finch, for The Cricket Society, will determine which takes home the £3,000 prize, won last year by Harry Pearson for Slipless in Settle.

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Close, D'Oliveira and Packer - the three men at the heart of a cricket revolution

CRICKET BOOKS

Cricket at the Crossroads: Class, Colour and Controversy from 1967 to 1977

Published by Elliott and Thompson

What’s it about?

The Swinging Sixties may have been notable for free love and psychedelic drugs and a new hedonistic pop culture but for the majority the Britain of 1967 was still essentially conventional and conservative, especially among its professional middle classes.

This was particularly true of cricket, which clung to the established demarcation lines of the class system as stubbornly as any area of society.  Until 1962, the annual match between Gentlemen and Players -- identifiable on scorecards by the position of their initials, before or after the surname – was still contested.  The fixture was a throwback to the kind of distinctions that set apart officers and the other ranks and domestic staff (downstairs) from their masters (upstairs) and the establishment cliques that ran cricket were not minded to challenge the traditional sociological order.

But outside the game the divisions were narrowing.  The line between working class and middle class was starting to blur and the economic dominance of the south was under threat.  There was a shift in cricket, too.  Where Surrey, led by the Charterhouse-educated England captain and amateur, Peter May, had dominated the County Championship in the 1950s, the 1960s was the era of Yorkshire, whose captain for much of the decade was the hard-nosed professional, Brian Close, whose roots were unashamedly working class.

Indeed, between 1967 and 1977, the decade that is the focus of Cricket at the Crossroads, the game experienced seismic change, propelled into a new era by three major crises.  Close, in fact, was the central figure in one of them, when his removal as England captain in 1967, despite a record of six wins and a draw from seven Tests, seemed to indicate that class prejudice was very much alive and well.  Less than two years later came the D’Oliveira affair, a significant moment in the breaking down of political apartheid in South Africa but one which again at times put the cricket establishment in an uncomfortable spotlight.  Finally came the emergence of Kerry Packer and World Series Cricket, moving the balance of power in the game for good.

Cricket at the Crossroads examines the personalities and attitudes that influenced this tumultuous era in cricket, using material drawn from original research and interviews to paint a vivid picture of the game in the 1960s and 70s, not only revealing what was going on behind the scenes as players sought to break the grip of the administrators, but setting it within a socio-economic context in a way not previously attempted.  It is a lively and entertaining read, for good measure.

Who is the author?

Guy Fraser-Sampson, who teaches at the Cass Business School in the City of London, has written a number of best-selling titles about finance and investment and his expertise is regularly sought in television and radio discussion programmes.  He has nurtured a love of cricket since he was a schoolboy, however, and his fascination with the influence of class and racial prejudices on the game in the 1960s and 70s led him to attempt to marry sporting and social history in his first cricket book.  A versatile writer, he has also won praise for Major Benjy, a novel written as a continuation of the Mapp and Lucia series penned by E. F.  Benson, and written with the blessing of Benson’s literary estate.

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More Books by Guy Fraser-Sampson

Amazon’s current top five cricket bestsellers

Fred Trueman: The Authorised Biography, by Chris Waters
Britain's Lost Cricket Grounds, by Chris Arnot
Graeme Swann: The Breaks are Off - My Autobiography
Start the Car: The World According to Bumble, by David Lloyd
The Last Flannelled Fool, by Michael Simkins

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Stuart Broad signs two-book deal as Simon & Schuster add more cricket books to their catalogue

CRICKET BOOKS

England cricketer Stuart Broad is hoping his popularity within the game and beyond will be reflected in substantial book sales when Stuart Broad’s World of Cricket is published this autumn.

The book is the first product of a two-book deal the 25-year-old fast-bowling all-rounder has signed with publishers Simon & Schuster UK.

Simon & Schuster are making a strong push in sports books this year, particularly books about cricket, with the autobiography of Broad’s England teammate James Anderson due out in September, which is also the scheduled publication date for a biography of spin bowling legend Shane Warne by the fine Australian cricket writer, Gideon Haigh.

Executive director Kyle MacRae described Broad as “the undoubted star of the current English cricketing generation.”

“Stuart’s professionalism and appeal across all age groups makes him the number one choice for people who want to learn about the game, his world and the wider areas of international cricket,” MacRae said. “This will be one of the biggest sports books of 2012.”

It will be Broad’s second venture into print, following on from Stuart Broad Bowled Over: An Ashes Celebration - My Side of the Story, published by Hodder & Stoughton in 2009.

Broad, the current England Twenty20 captain, a Twenty20 world champion and an Ashes winner in 2009, is back in Test match action this week as England begin their three-match series against Pakistan in Dubai.

Broad is England's fourth most-followed on Twitter

Stuart Broad's popularity is reflected is a Twitter following that today stood at 234,672 -- although he is not the most followed England player.

Anderson, in fact, commands a bigger audience for his Tweets, with 253,198 followers, although both have much ground to make up on Broad’s Nottinghamshire teammate, Graeme Swann, whose frequently quirky and occasionally outspoken comments attract an impressive 331,335 regulars.

No surprise that Swann’s autobiography, The Breaks Are Off, was the best-selling cricket book of 2011. The paperback edition is due out in May this year.

Yet they all trail by some distance in the wake of the England dressing room’s most talked-about character, former captain and star batsman Kevin Pietersen, who at the last count had some 436,352 hanging on his every Tweet.

Graeme Swann: The Breaks are Off - My Autobiography
Stuart Broad Bowled Over: An Ashes Celebration - My Side of the Story

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Hobbs, Trueman, Botham and Swann among a quality crop of cricket life stories

Books about cricket

Stumped for a Christmas gift idea? Let The Sports Bookshelf guide you through the maze of possibilities to make the right choice. Here's our selection of cricket biographies published this year:  

Jack Hobbs: England's Greatest Cricketer, by Leo McKinstry (Yellow Jersey)

In a career spanning 30 years playing for Surrey and England, Sir Jack Hobbs scored 61,237 runs, more than any other cricketer.


His 197 centuries is also a record unsurpassed. He was heralded as one of Wisden’s Five Cricketers of the 20th Century yet his place in the history of cricket always seems to be in the shadow of W.G. Grace, Don Bradman, Wally Hammond and Len Hutton. Why? Perhaps because Hobbs, born in poor circumstances in Cambridge at a time when the town had more than its share of grim and squalid streets, was brought up to be modest and humble and appreciative of his good fortune.

McKinstry, an excellent writer and the author of fine biographies of Geoffrey Boycott, Sir Alf Ramsey and the Charlton brothers, Jack and Bobby, has produced a thorough account of Hobbs’s life that captures the spirit of the age and will help re-establish his proper place in the cricketing pantheon.


Fred Trueman, by Chris Waters (Aurum Press)

Chris Waters, the latest to occupy the influential position as cricket correspondent of the Yorkshire Post, invested many hours in his first attempt to write the biographer of a player, determined to do justice to the Yorkshire and England fast bowler, whose record and character continue to loom large over the history of cricket in the county.  He should be congratulated; he has produced a work to match the stature of his subject.

He undertook the project with the blessing of Trueman’s surviving family members and yet does not allow himself to gloss over any of Fiery Fred’s rougher edges.  He offers praise where it is merited but highlights imperfections just as judiciously, from the poverty of his childhood that Trueman shrouded in myth to the complexities of personality that contributed to the controversial nature of his career on the field and his relationship with the establishment.

As a Trueman biographer, Waters had a couple of tough acts to follow in Don Mosey and John Arlott, both of whom knew their subject personally.  Waters met him only once yet has skilfully interpreted what he gleaned from his research and countless interviews to paint a picture of the man perhaps more convincingly than either of his illustrious predecessors.

Further reading:  Trueman biography reveals real story of 'the finest bloody fast bowler that ever drew breath'

Tony Greig, by David Tossell (Pitch Publishing)

David Tossell’s stylishly-written and well-researched books have earned him a short-listing for the British Sports Book Awards on three occasions in three sports, which says something for his consistency and versatility.

He went close to being honoured for his biography of former Arsenal manager Bertie Mee in 2006 and, in 2010, for Nobody Beats Us, the story of the great Wales rugby team of the 1970s, and in 2008, for Grovel!, an examination of West Indies cricket and in particular the 1976 team that won the Test series in England by a 3-0 margin, blowing away the home side with the power of a pace attack led by Michael Holding and Andy Roberts.

Grovel! owed its title to the unwise boast by the England captain, Tony Greig, that a touring side he perceived as lacking backbone under pressure would be made to ‘grovel’.  The comment was not the only controversy in the career of the South African-born all-rounder, the biggest of which, of course, was his involvement with the Australian media magnate Kerry Packer in helping to set up the breakaway World Series Cricket by secretly recruiting players.

Tossell argues that the widespread condemnation that the Packer episode heaped on Greig led to an undervaluing of his contribution to cricket as a player and to an overlooking of a fascinating story, not the least part of which was his battle to succeed despite a history of epilepsy.  His even-handed re-assessment is another fine piece of work.

Further reading: Tossell in line for cricket book award

Arthur Milton: Last of the Double Internationals, by Mike Vockins (SportsBooks)

Arthur Milton’s modesty was such that when he took a job as a postman in Bristol after his career in sport came to an end he did not see it as a humbling experience but an uplifting one, something of which he could be just as proud as his appearance on the wing for the England football team or his six Test caps won as an astute opening batsman.

Unconvinced that he had a story worth telling, he declined all invitations to write his autobiography until 2006 -- the year before he died -- when he asked Mike Vockins, the former secretary of Worcestershire County Cricket Club and a long-time friend, to bring along a notebook and tape recorder and finally commit his story to print.

As the last player to represent his country at football and cricket, he did have a story to tell, and quite a few more, and Vockins, who for many years maintained parallel careers in cricket administration and the clergy, tells them very well, with affection and respect but no lack of thorough research.

Further reading:  Affectionate portrait of a man as happy delivering letters as posting runs for England

Ian Botham: The Power and the Glory, by Simon Wilde (Simon & Schuster)

After seeing three of his books, including biographies of Ranjitsinhji and Shane Warne, make the shortlist for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year, when Simon Wilde turned his attention to Ian Botham it was not difficult to imagine another contender emerging.  In the event, Ian Botham: The Power and the Glory did not even make the long list.

Yet it has won no shortage of critical acclaim.  Peter Wilby, reviewing in The Guardian, said that Wilde‘s ‘perfectly paced and exhaustively researched biography, recalls the magic of that astonishing summer (of 1981, when he almost single-handedly changed the course of an Ashes series) but doesn't neglect the darker side of Botham's career and character, revealing a more complex and nuanced personality than the gruff, self-confident exterior suggested.’  Dan Jones, in the Spectator, said that Wilde’s ‘judgment is sound and his storytelling pleasingly laconic’ and that by identifying Botham's attempt to make himself an early beneficiary from a nascent culture of celebrity, Wilde successfully placed him ‘at the heart of his times.”

Thorough, measured and characteristically well written by Sunday Times cricket correspondent Wilde, The Power and the Glory deserves its place among the cricket biographies of the year.

Graeme Swann: The Breaks are Off -- My Autobiography(Hodder & Stoughton)

In an era when sports press officers, particularly those who serve the interests of the national teams, seek almost unavoidably to make their charges as blandly non-controversial as possible, Graeme Swann stands out.

England’s hugely successful off-spin bowler, no doubt yearning for the days -- not so long past -- when even professional cricket had an inherent social flavour, would rather say what he thinks, play for laughs and refresh himself in whatever way takes his fancy. He is what passes now for a character.

The Breaks are Off makes that very plain, revealing Swann at his wise-cracking, straight-talking and enthusiastically imbibing best in a story that will amuse and delight his army of supporters, who currently number 312,000 among Twitter users alone.

As a biography, it does not reveal as much about the Swann beneath the surface as some readers would probably like, but that should not be taken as a criticism. Swann's romp through the peaks and troughs of his career is a thoroughly entertaining ride and his anecdotes are told with much skill by his ghostwriter, Richard Gibson, whose ability to translate jokey conversation into laugh-out-loud prose has already been demonstrated in David ‘Bumble’ Lloyd’s amusing ramble, the best-selling Start the Car.

Further reading: A bloody nose from Darren Gough marks Swann's debut as an England cricket tourist

More books by Leo McKinstry
More books by David Tossell
More books by Simon Wilde

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