Should Cowdrey be Captain? part 1.

posted by John Winn

During the early part of lockdown I reread MCC, the autobiography of Colin Cowdrey which stirred my interest in this enigmatic cricketer and more recently I bought a copy of The Last Roman, a biography of Cowdrey by Mark Peel. The question that I have used as the title for this posting is a recurring issue in  the second of these two books and in MCC's obituary in the 2001 Wisden the rights and wrongs of Cowdrey's captaincy of England are described as 'the saga that dominated English cricket through the 1960s'

When Len Hutton stepped down from first class cricket in 1955 the selectors, probably with some relief, returned to the template for captaincy that had been the norm before appointing Hutton in 1952 as the first professional captain, namely amateur, public school, Oxbridge. Peter May three years older than Cowdrey and with more tests under his belt, ticked all these boxes and was duly appointed. There were those who, at the time, thought the honour came too soon and had not David Shepherd begun training for the ministry he might have been preferred. But May it was and until illness forced his retirement in 1962 when fit he was the automatic choice.

Cowdrey, amateur, Tonbridge, Oxford, also had the right cv and his opportunity* came in the West Indies in 1959/60 when May, who probably should not have toured had a reoccurrence of his illness and Cowdrey stepped into the breach for ten tests in which England were unbeaten. Despite this successful run there was never any question that if and when fit May would return although by this time another candidate had entered right, Ted Dexter, amateur, Radley, Cambridge.

Having taken 1960 off May returned to cricket in the following summer, ready for an Ashes series. An ankle injury prevented him  from playing in the first test but when he he returned to the side at Lord's, Cowdrey, who had been bailed out by Subba Row and Dexter at Edgbaston continued as captain. Defeat followed and May resumed as skipper for Trueman's match at Headingley where the Yorkshire bowler took 11 wickets in the match and the series was levelled. Defeat at Old Trafford, in circumstances too painful to recount, meant that the Ashes stayed with Benaud's men and three weeks later May played his last test.

At this point Cowdrey, who had had a disappointing series, for 'family reasons' made himself unavailable for the tour of India and Pakistan. The selectors cannot have taken long to appoint 'Lord Ted' as his successor. Peel, writes that 'Dexter's leadership in India and Pakistan had not won universal acclaim' although Wisden says 'Dexter...did well' and this ambivalence seems to have transferred itself to the selectors who used the 1962 series against Pakistan to assess the qualities
of the two men. More next time

Cowdrey, middle row second from the right. aged 13 in the Tonbridge XI,

* Cowdrey had actually captained England in two tests in 1959 when May was ill but the series had already been won and he had initially been left out of the side to allow the selectors to experiment. When May withdrew he was recalled as skipper for the last two tests. The West Indies was a much sterner test.