The Club Cricket Conference Yearbook 2020

- 88 - CHARLES RANDALL 16th November 1948 – 31st January 2020 For about 30 years, Charlie was on cricket 7 days a week, reporting on cricket for the Daily Telegraph and playing as much as time allowed. A top order bat and specialist gully fielder, he was a member of Radlett CC for over 50 years, part of a talented 1st team in the 1960s and 1970s with the likes of Geoff Dawson and Nick Draper, culminating in a flurry of centuries and a Herts trial in 1979. In more recent years Charlie captained the Radlett 5th team, coaxing performances out of a bunch of players too young, too old or otherwise unsuitable for other teams, and winning promotion to Herts division 10 in 2010, making his side comfortably the highest placed club 5th team in the county for a few years. As well as skill with bat and ball, owning a car was a good way for a player to ensure selection, such were the number of colts in the squad who would need to get to the ground somehow. Charlie would spend most of the week on the admin but then contributed heavily with runs and wickets; he scored a league century at Letchworth aged 64, an innings that featured few quick singles but plenty of powerful pulls through mid-on, a trademark shot. In his youth he bowled Chinamen, confusing keeper and slips as much as batsmen with his wrong-un, a ball designed to terrify rather than get a wicket. Years later he sent down many overs of orthodox left arm spin for Radlett 4th and 5th teams. He was an advocate for the social side of continued…