There are a multitude of reasons for selecting someone for the England team. Obviously class, form and ability help, but beyond that are issues like 'horses for courses' (e.g. picking typical 'English' seamers at Headingley like Steve Watkin and Neil Mallender), or being a good player of a particular style of bowling (David Smith for the West Indies for example, or R
oger Tolchard in India)
Fortunately the days of selection based on 'playing for Kent/Surrey/Middlesex rather than a northern county' seem to have past, along with 'Public School education and possession of a posh accent' - although some of us have scratched our head recently over the choices of Ashley Giles ('Non playing captain's best mate') and Paul Nixon ('Sledging ability')
Of course, there's often been another side of the coin in terms of reasons not to pick a certain player. 'Being an outspoken Yorkshireman' cost Fred Trueman at least twenty test appearances during his career. Had he played them, he'd still be England's top wicket-taker. In the same vein, cricketers of the quality of Doug Padgett & Jimmy Binks played one game each for England whilst vastly inferior players enjoyed extended runs in the team for no better reason than their accent.
Nothing however, has ever plumbed the depths of English selectorial ineptitude compared with what happened in 1988 when a whole new 'criteria' was added.
The visitors that year were the West Indies, probably just past their mid 80's pomp (the 1984 side were the best team to ever tour these shores) - but still boasting an awesome bowling line up of Marshall, Patterson, Ambrose & Walsh and a batting order that went - Greenidge, Haynes, Richards, Richardson, Hooper, followed by the vastly underrated Jeffrey Dujon & Gus Logie. If cricket had a Hall of Fame, at least six of that side would be in it.
The England batting line-up wasn't too shabby - The 3Gs (Gooch, Gatting & Gower) together with Chris Broad and Alan Lamb made a fair nucleus - but on the bowling front the attack was decidedly 'pop-gun' after Graham Dilley with names like Jarvis, Newport and Pringle featuring.
In the rain affected first test at Nottingham, England got away with a fairly credible draw- but the test has gone down in history for what allegedly happened in a hotel room after the game... the outcome of which was a 'holier than thou' campaign from the wonderful, morally pure, English tabloid which culminated in the sacking of Mike Gatting.
So the captaincy baton was passed to John Embuery. That'll be the same John Embuery who went on one 'rebel tour' to South Africa in 1982, was banned, returned to the England team and then went on another 'rebel tour' in 1990 and was banned again, and then picked for England again. You can really only have slack-jawed admiration that sort of commitment to filthy lucre - words like 'venal' and 'whore' don't do it justice. It also gives a good insight into the English authorities attitude towards apartheid South Africa compared with unfounded rumours of a night with a hotel waitress.
Anyway, Embuery presided over two big defeats - first at Lords, despite one of the all time legendary first morning spells of quick bowling by Graham Dilley, and then Manchester, where the batting fell apart in humiliating fashion. So it was out with Embuery, but who should replace him?
The Sunday before the Leeds Test I arrived at my club for that afternoon's game. I'd missed the traditional lunchtime announcement so walked into something of a 'heated debate' on entering the changing room.
- Heard the England side?
- No - who's in?
- They've picked Robin Smith.
- Wow - a good choice! Pass the smelling salts!
- And Tim Curtis.
- Hmmm bit of a county journeyman but probably deserves a chance with the runs he's been making for Worcestershire.
- And they've made Cowdrey captain!!
- Cowdrey?! You're joking - that's ridiculous... (Clutching at straws time) Well, I suppose he did ok against Lillee & Thompson in 1974/75. I know we're desperate, but he must be in his fifties - though, having said that he always was a good player of pace bowling - you know, Hall, Griffith, Adcock, Heine. He might be able to do a decent job...
- No, not Colin Cowdrey - it's his SON, Chris!!
So there you have it - the new criteria – ‘Pick your Godson who happens to be the son of your best friend’! Bear in mind that Chris Cowdrey hadn't played Test Cricket since England’s tour to India in1984/85, and hadn't built up a particularly strong CV then - and was hardly setting the world on fire as captain of his county side, Kent.
Gradually, over the coming weeks, the stories started filtering out – the Chairman in question Peter May, Chris Cowdrey’s godfather, apparently overriding the rest of the committee who wanted Graham Gooch as skipper, rumours that he was doing it as a favour to Cowdrey Senior for some past business deal. In short, a traditional British establishment stitch up. One journalist described the noise of the selector’s explanation as 'the sound of an escape of noxious gas from a rotting corpse.'
Funnily enough, I've met Chris Cowdrey a couple of times since 1988. He's got a well-honed line in louche self-deprecation that quite a few second-tier English establishment figures have - and has made a nice living on the public speaking circuit with his view of the farce, based around the normal godson/godfather relationship - 'Thanks for the captaincy Uncle Peter, but the usual pen-and-pencil set would have been fine'...
England were rolled over again in the Headingley Test, and Cowdrey developed a 'thigh strain' before The Oval, which mysteriously cleared up in time for him to play for Kent. Presumably even Peter May didn't think he push the envelope far enough to give 'young Christopher' another game at the helm.
Graham Gooch, who was the obvious choice to replace Gatting all along - the only England player to appear in all 5 tests, took over. I'd have loved to have been a fly on the wall at the selection meeting when comprehensive educated, 'East London born' Gooch was chosen. You can only guess that they thought it was the 'East London' in South Africa.