Where's the fun? Derek Randall and Spinwash show the joyful chaos of yesteryear

Where's the fun? Derek Randall and Spinwash show the joyful chaos of yesteryear

Rich Clarke
CricketPaper


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Last week saw the 50th anniversary of Derek Randall’s debut as a professional cricketer.

He did not bat or bowl as Garry Sobers’ Nottinghamshire lost to Surrey in the John Player League in June 1971. But it probably did not matter because, as the BBC Nottinghamshire cricket commentator Dave Bracegirdle pointed out when remembering the anniversary, “no-one has ever looked happier on a cricket field”.

Like the rest of his career, Randall’s most famous moment – doffing his cap at Dennis Lillee during the Centenary Test of 1977 – cannot be remembered without a smile.

The slightly-built batsman with an array of nervous peccadillos had spent his first innings avoiding missiles directed at his head from the snarling fast bowler. In his second, Randall was hit on his cap, there were no helmets then. He fell to the ground, rolled over, rubbed his head and carried on. He would make a dashing 174, one of the bravest innings ever played by an Englishman abroad. Throughout, he chuntered as himself “Wake up, Rags, concentrate. Get stuck in. You idiot, Rags. Concentrate, Rags, come on, come on. Come on England”. It amused and irritated the Australians in equal measure.

As a youngster, Randall was by far my favourite non-Essex player. OK, he was one of the best fielders in the world but there were far more consistent players with the bat. However, it was his sheer joy in playing the game that shone through. This was the late 1970s and early 1980s, closer in years to the end of the Second World War than to today. They were still playing George Formby and Norman Wisdom films on Saturday afternoons. These ever-smiling, working-class heroes would be used and abused in the first reel, normally by an authority figure with a posh accent, only to triumph through fortitude and kindness in the second with a few scrapes and jokes on the way. Randall played this little-man-made-good role on the cricket pitch. He was never fully trusted by the selectors, who also happened to have posh accents, but still managed to amass 47 caps. He only ever played professionally for Nottinghamshire and, tellingly, the biggest thrills and disappointments in his career came in cup finals for them. Randall resisted the rand of the rebel tours and handed his three ‘Man of the Match’ Test medals to his mother as a thank you for her support. The title of his biography borrowed the name of one of the songs he chose on Desert Island Discs – The Sun Has Got Its Hat On.

Is there anyone in cricket who possesses even a tenth of his ‘joie de vivre’ these days?

Let’s not disappear down a nostalgic rabbit-hole here. Players are more skilful, fit and disciplined now, while rules have been tinkered with to provide better entertainment. A few short decades before Randall’s debut, ‘professional’ was a pejorative term spat out by upper class ‘amateurs’, who supposedly played the game for art’s sake. These days being “unprofessional” is the biggest criticism you can throw at a cricketer.


Despite all this, the lack of joy in the modern game makes me sad. The last Test was a clear example. Ollie Robinson’s tweets were abhorrent and indefensible but they were also sitting on his timeline for years before, in an incredible coincidence, ‘emerging’ on the day of his England debut. Then Joe Root refused to take up the gauntlet thrown down by New Zealand on the final morning so we had to entertain ourselves. The biggest smile of the entire five days came when that affable MCC member struggled to get a cagoule over his head.

In the same week, Sky Sports premiered Spinwash, a documentary about England’s disastrous tour of India in 1993. Home video shot by Dermot Reeve, an all-rounder in the squad, allowed us to see dressing room banter, nights out and general tour shenanigans. The team were well beaten after controversially leaving out David Gower and Jack Russell. Meanwhile, Graham Gooch was stricken by dodgy prawns, Phil Tufnell was fined for ill discipline and Reeve’s mother had to take on scoring duties after Clem Driver suffered a heart attack. But, despite it all, the players looked back on the trip with fondness as it was the last ‘fun’ tour England ever undertook.

I am not arguing against modern rigour here. Our national team were shambolic during this period and we demand our highly-paid stars deliver these days. Meanwhile, negative news continues to resonate with readers. The Bob Willis Trophy last year received little national attention until the Essex reserve wicketkeeper poured celebratory beer over the head of Feroze Khushi, a Muslim, on the balcony. Again, I am not defending the response, only the way bad news travels further and faster than good.

Both this and Robinson’s tweets are important lessons but, at the same time, it will put every modern player on their guard, second-guessing their own actions and, in all probability, reigning in their personality in public. The media training they receive already teaches them to say nothing. I know this, I have taught it to professional footballers.

Fans want to feel they know their heroes and they judge their personalities based on the meagre clues that seep into the public domain. Fortunately, as Shane Warne says “the way you play your cricket is the way you live your life”. The very length of time on the pitch means those personal guards are hard to maintain. That was certainly true of Randall, who lived a life of lovable chaos.

However, there was always method in his madness.

“Garry Sobers taught me the way cricket should be played,” Randall once said. “Number one: play hard. Number two: play fair. But most importantly, you've always got to entertain the crowd.”

Precisely.

* This article first appeared in The Cricket Paper, get it every Sunday or subscribe here




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