Derbyshire's greatest bowler?

Posted by John Winn

 Readers may recall in August the publication of a magazine unashamedly nostalgic in content looking back at cricket from the 50s to the 90s. The magazine was called Backspin and the first edition was described by the publishers as a pilot. I bought the magazine, enjoyed the read and am pleased to see that the second edition is now on sale and future editions will be published quarterly. The next five issues can be secured for £20.

Tucked away in the August copy was a note about Darley Abbey CC, members of the Derbyshire Premier and County Cricket Leagues who in May 2007 had been the victims of an arson attack on the club pavilion which had taken four years to rebuild, but despite the setback run three senior sides and a number of junior teams. Readers were invited to mage a donation to club funds in return for which they would receive a copy of a biography of Les Jackson, without much argument Derbyshire's greatest bowler although some might press the claims of Darley's president, Mike Hendrick.

The author of the slim volume,140 pages, is Mike Carey, very much a Derbyshire man, if you can pick up Radio Derby then you can here him introduce  'Memorable Melodies' each Sunday afternoon at four which although I have not heard it sounds as though it might be typical  local radio listening  for that time of the week. Mike used to write for both The Guardian and The Telegraph and presented John Player League cricket on BBC 2 as well as a stint on TMS.

I sent a donation and as well as receiving a copy of the book I was delighted to receive letters of thanks from the author and club secretary Dave Jepson. 'Les Jackson A Derbyshire Legend'. had been published in 1997 and the fact that the author still had spare copies15 years on  suggested it had not sold like hot cakes or even Derbyshire oatcakes, a view that was reinforced when I noted copies were available in the county club shop end of season sale for £1, which believe me is less than my donation! The book was very briefly reviewed in Wisden in 1998 and described as' a little book about a great hearted man', which sums it up nicely. Les Jackson was a man about whom there should be a book but I suspect you could dig deeper even than the subject did in his winter occupation as a coal miner without digging up any dirt or racy incidents or the kind of colourful stories that appear in a  more recent biography of another great fast bowler. Les was just a thoroughly decent man and apart perhaps from some of those who made up the 1670 wickets he took in 17 seasons for his county you probably wouldn't find anybody who would say a bad word about a man who heard the call of over almost 14000 times.

Of course there is a peg to hang a story on for despite all those wickets and there are no shortage of great cricketers quoted in the book prepared to speak of his greatness built on accuracy, almost 30% of his overs in the championship were maidens, and mastery of seam movement. The peg is of course that he only played two tests and they were 12 years apart and yet in the book's foreword Fred Truman says he should have played at least 30 more. One answer to the question why didn't he? is another question, who would you have left out? Jackson's two tests were in 1949 and 1961, nicely wrapped round an era of great English fast bowlers: FST himself plus Statham, Tyson, Bedser and you may wish to add more.

Jackson died in 2007 aged 86 and his Wisden obituary addresses the question as to why a man about whom county batsmen got more and more nervous the nearer they got to Chesterfield or Derby was ignored by the selectors for twelve years and after his second test was dropped in favour of Jack Flavell. The conspiracy theories are there which touch upon the prejudices of selectors F R Brown and Gubby Allen but perhaps the explanation is simply that he was at his prime in an era when 'unfashionable bowlers from unfashionable counties were at a disadvantage'. In the same volume of Wisden are obituaries of two other men who were feared for their accuracy up and down the country, Tom Cartwright and Derek Shackleton who together with Les Jackson played only fourteen tests in total.' Cricketers' cricketers', even if not favoured by selectors.