Sheffield Cricket Lovers' Society Year Book 2023

- the last 73 years JOHN HOPKINS takes his opportunity to chart the history of his favourite tourists, including a chat with one of the Kiwis’ greatest ever players. NEW ZEALAND CRICKET New Zealand, captained by Walter Hadlee, were the 1949 tourists. On my first ever trip to Lord’s I saw them play Middlesex in a game starting on a Saturday in late August. Middlesex batting first, with Denis Compton my schoolboy hero scoring 148, were all out in the day, leaving NZ with a few overs to bat out to the close. I well remember their opening batsmen that day, Bert Sutcliffe from Otago and Vic Smith from Canterbury. As an impressionable ten year old, overseas geography fascinated me as it still does to this day, hence the province names. That series was unique in the fact that all four tests were allocated a mere three days, the same as the county game at that time. Both teams had strong batting line ups but bowling attacks that weren’t good enough to dismiss the opponents twice in the space of just three days, hence each game was drawn. Bert Sutcliffe, one of the best left hand batsmen in the world at the time, and Martin Donnelly, a former Oxford blue, each scored a century in the series. But someone who was to make a mark for NZ over the next 17 years was John Reid. Very much the baby of the touring team he was chosen to play in the 3rd and 4th Tests, 14 14 scoring a 50 on his debut and 93 in the final Test when he batted at number three. It was not until 1958 that NZ, now captained by Reid, next toured England. They were not a strong side and lost a five match series four nil. However, prior to that, Reid had captained NZ to their first ever Test victory in 1955 - after 26 years of trying. Reid died in October 2000 aged 92. Quoting from his obituary in the 2021 Wisden, New Zealand journalist John Mahaffey wrote John Reid