It must have been some time in 1954 that I started to get interested in cricket. One of the first series I followed really closely was the one between Engand and South Africa in 1955. Thinking about incidents from that series that stand out in my memory, a famous shot by Paul Winslow takes pride of place. I refer to it in the passage below, excerpted from a piece I wrote for the Spring 1999 issue of the Journal of the Cricket Society…
My whole cricket-following identity was shaped by the fact that it used not to be thus [i.e. South Africa did not often beat England]. As a boy growing up in Rhodesia, for cricketing purposes the country then part of South Africa, I had to come to terms with the bitter realization that while my beloved Springboks – my Tayfield and McGlew long ago – could take on and beat England in a Test match here or there, they could not triumph in a whole series, not, at any rate, if you discounted ancient history. Battles they could win, but never the war.
South Africa at Old Trafford. It is a significant moment in this formative personal saga, scene of a famous victory in 1955. Let us recall something of that era. To a young opposing fan, England are not just England, they are a powerful, winning England. In the previous winter Tyson and Statham have laid Australia low to help retain the Ashes. In the following summer Laker will do the business, seeing off the old enemy again. This is the England so recently of Hutton, and it is Compton, May, Cowdrey, Graveney, Evans. South Africa arrive at Old Trafford two down after two Tests. They have lost by an innings at Trent Bridge and by 71 runs at Lord’s, in turn Tyson and Statham the cause of their, and my, disappointment. I would give a lot, at the age of 11 probably even my education, for South Africa to prevail.
For this South African team, the South Africa of the mid-1950s, is my team. It is the team of my life, the one lodged in the deepest recesses of my consciousness. Wherever it might stand – and that would not be enormously high – in an objective all-time ranking, for me it begins the enduring, the unbreakable tie with cricket. Whether of my three principal heroes or of those others who surrounded them, every name is vivid: Tayfield, McGlew and McLean; and Cheetham, Goddard, Endean, Waite, Adcock, Heine. And all their initials too: H.J., D.J. and R.A.; J.E., T.L., W.R., J.H.B., N.A.T., P.S. – none of which have I now had to look up to check. This is still largely the team that had gone to Australia virtually unknown in 1952-53 to take on the likes of Miller, Lindwall, Harvey, Morris and Benaud, and returned having shared the series 2-2. It is the team that was known for its superlative fielding at a time when the general standard in that department of the game was much lower than it is now.
So my team comes to Old Trafford in 1955 and it turns the tide in a memorable game, winning by three wickets with just nine balls to spare. A couple of features of this game especially stand out for me. The first is that there were three centurions in the South African first innings, McGlew, Waite and Winslow. There is a photograph of them, abreast before the pavilion at Old Trafford and walking towards the camera. In the way of such things, there they continue to walk for all time. The second memory is that Paul Winslow, whose innings in that Test is described in Wisden as having been ‘worthy almost of Jessop himself’, brought up his hundred with a legendary hit, a six that cleared the sightscreen at the Stretford End, bouncing down into the practice ground beyond. It is still talked about at Old Trafford, as I can personally vouchsafe.
Here are some contemporary accounts of the Winslow six:
Winslow, who at times drove with great power, was dropped when 64 and he reached his hundred with a mighty straight hit for 6 over the sightscreen. – Wisden 1956
He reached his 100 just before tea in the grand manner. The stroke which took him from 96 to 102 was one of the longest six-hits I have seen for many a year. – Bruce Harris, England versus South Africa 1955
There was no dithering by this gay adventurer. He sent the 400 up with a two, then reached his century off the next ball with the biggest hit ever seen at Old Trafford – a mighty towering straight drive off Lock that landed on the roof behind the screen and bounded into the county practice ground beyond. – Norman Cutler, Behind the South African Tests
Winslow’s score crept up and up – and in the last over before tea, [he] took his score to 96 with a square cut off Lock’s bowling. There were two balls to go, and I had hardly expressed the hope in the Pavilion that Paul wouldn’t get out trying to get his century before tea, when he took one step up the wicket and straight drove the next delivery clean over the boundary, the ball landing in the car park fully fifty yards out of the field. A magnificent six to cap a magnificent innings – the sort of superb spectacular hitting one rarely sees in Test cricket these days. – Jack Cheetham, I Declare
Paul will continue to hit bowlers many a mile for many a while, but I cannot quite see that his spontaneous aggression quite fits in to a Test match picture… I would like to think that Test cricket was still played that way, but times have changed. Head down and no hooking before half-past-two, is much more the order of the day, for better or for worse. – Gordon Ross in South African Cricket Annual 1955
… like the hero in schoolboy fiction… South African Cricket Annual 1955
The storm of applause for 400 had barely faded when there broke out a roar that will surely echo down the years. Winslow had 96. True to his batting credo that “everything is sweetened by risk” he jumped forward to Lock and drove an enormous straight six to reach his hundred. The ball, which might have been seen by millions had it not been an hour too soon for the television programme, sailed up towards the idle cameras, landed on the lean-to roof of a small stand and ricochetted into a car park in the practise field. It was recovered by a constable and solemnly carried to the boundary’s edge – as though under arrest – before being handed over. This second outburst by Winslow… was like a fable concocted in fiction – the daring heroic stroke that nearly all test batsmen vainly dream about. Denis Compton said that in all his years of cricket he had never heard a century so riotously acclaimed… Winslow laughed, as well he might, and waved to his enthusiastic team-mates on their balcony. The biggest adventure of his life had come off. – Louis Duffus, Springbok Glory
South Africa went on to win the fourth Test as well, levelling the series, only then to lose the deciding game at the Oval.
[For links to the other posts in this series, see here.]