Available in paperback for the first time, Cricket and Community in England: 1800 to the Present Day is a path-breaking enquiry into the social history of the summer game. It is written by two specialist cricket historians and based on extensive primary research. It traces the history of the sport at grassroots level from its origins right up to the present day. It will appeal to the cricket historian and the general sports enthusiast alike. The book has two main goals: to provide readers with an accessible introduction to the history of grassroots cricket in England and to supply a clear overview of the different phases of this history. The structure of book is chronological but also thematic. The six chapters look at such issues as early cricket, the origins of clubs, competition, the two world wars, multiculturalism and cricket in the twenty-first century. -- .

Shane Warne, who died in 2022, is universally acknowledged as one of the greatest cricketers of all time - and the greatest spin bowler ever. Warne in Wisden records the highlights of an exceptional career - handpicked from all Wisden publications over a twenty-plus-year period and curated for a global audience. Warne in Wisden features coverage from Warne's first Test against India in 1992 - where he took one wicket - to his retirement from Test cricket in 2007, having taken 708 Test wickets. It includes complete reports and scorecards for key Tests, as well as Wisden's assessment of his impact on the English county game and the Indian Premier League, and his journey from master spinner to global celebrity. Warne combined a prodigious talent for leg-spin with a turbulent life off the pitch. While Wisden's focus was generally on his cricket, Warne in Wisden also relates the controversies and rows that earned him a occasional mention in the Chronicle section of the book. Wisden's authoritative and independent voice/writing provides a unique insight into one of the most discussed cricketers in history. Warne in Wisden includes: Cricketer of the Year by Vic Marks, 1994 'A Spin-Doctor Writes' by Ashley Mallett, 1997 Five Cricketers of the Century, 2000-13 Leading Cricketer in the World, 2004-2005 'The mighty craftsman' by Mike Atherton 2007 'The Ashes Masters' by David Frith 2009 The ebbs and flows of Warne's 21 -year -long career His obituary and related articles from Wisden Cricketers' Almanack 2023 Scorecards of his most significant Test matches Colour plate section

Many books have been written about the 1966 World Cup but this one is different. Brian Scovell was the only national newspaper sports writer-for the 'Daily Sketch'-to report on both the World Cup and the England v West Indies series dominated by Gary Sobers. He had full access to the heroes like Bobby Charlton, who was nearly run over on the day of the Final, Bobby Moore, who was sacked by West Ham just before the event and reinstated, Eusebio, Alf Ramsey, Colin Cowdrey, Tom Graveney, Brian Close, Ken Barrington, Wes Hall and all the leading figures. He contrasts these stirring and sportsmanlike happenings against what is occurring now-greed and corruption in football and the absence of genuine heroes in cricket. His 'on the spot reports' from his cuttings and the book he wrote on the Test series at the time, 'Everything that's cricket,' brings to life the action which captivated the nation. This is his 27th book and four of them have been short listed by the British Sports Books Award. After the 'Sketch' was merged with the 'Daily Mail' in 1971, he completed forty years with Associated Newspapers before retiring to write books.

Never Surrender: The Life of Douglas Jardine is the enthralling story of England's most controversial cricket captain, forever associated with bodyline bowling on MCC's tour to Australia in 1932/33. Despite his privileged upbringing and amateur status, Jardine's steely personality and win-at-all-costs ethos was more akin to the professional game. Confronted with the run-making genius of Australia's Don Bradman in 1932/33, Jardine resorted to a form of intimidatory bowling that helped England regain the Ashes, but his tactics shocked Australia and brought relations between the two countries to the point of collapse. To restore harmony, Jardine was disowned by the MCC cricket establishment and shunned thereafter, but now - in a more modern, competitive age - his reputation has undergone a rehabilitation, not least in Australia. Drawing on fresh material, award-winning cricket author Mark Peel reappraises an outstanding leader whose care for those he valued knew no bounds.

'An astonishing work of research, detail and revelation. Bulging with information, packed with nuggets.' John Etheridge, Sun 'Superbly researched... His eye for detail never wavers. It's a pleasure to read.' Vic Marks, Observer 'The Cricket Book of the Year: Dauntingly comprehensive and surprisingly light-footed.' Simon Briggs, Daily Telegraph England: The Biography is the most comprehensive account of the England cricket team that has ever been published, taking the reader into the heart of the action and the team dynamics that have helped shape their success, or otherwise. It is now 140 years since England first played Test match cricket and, for much of that time, it has struggled to perform to the best of its capabilities. In the early years, amateurs would pick and choose which matches and tours they would play; subsequently, the demands of the county game - and the petty jealousies that created - would prevent many from achieving their best. It was only in the 1990s that central contracts were brought in, and Team England began to receive the best possible support from an ever-increasing backroom team. But cricket isn't just about structures, it depends like no other sport on questions of how successful the captain is in motivating and leading his team, and how well different personalities and egos are integrated and managed in the changing room. From Joe Root and Alastair Cook back to Mike Atherton, Mike Brearley and Ray Illingworth, England captains have had a heavy influence on proceedings. Recent debates over Kevin Pietersen were nothing new, as contemporaries of W.G.Grace would doubtless recognise. As England play their 1000th Test, this is a brilliant and unmissable insight into the ups and downs of that story.

In 1932, England's cricket team, led by the haughty Douglas Jardine, had the fastest bowler in the world: Harold Larwood. Australia boasted the most prolific batsman the game had ever seen: the young Don Bradman. He had to be stopped. The leg-side bouncer onslaught inflicted by Larwood and Bill Voce, with a ring of fieldsmen waiting for catches, caused an outrage that reverberated to the back of the stands and into the highest levels of government. Bodyline, as this infamous technique came to be known, was repugnant to the majority of cricket-lovers. It was also potentially lethal - one bowl fracturing the skull of Australian wicketkeeper Bert Oldfield - and the technique was outlawed in 1934. After the death of Don Bradman in 2001, one of the most controversial events in cricketing history - the Bodyline technique - finally slid out of living memory. Over seventy years on, the 1932-33 Ashes series remains the most notorious in the history of Test cricket between Australia and England. David Frith's gripping narrative has been acclaimed as the definitive book on the whole saga: superbly researched and replete with anecdotes, Bodyline Autopsy is a masterly anatomy of one of the most remarkable sporting scandals.

Cricket is an enduring paradox. On the one hand, it symbolises much that is outmoded: imperialism; a leisured elite; a rural, aristocratic Englishness. On the other, it endures as a global game and does so by skilful adaptation, trading partly on its mythic past and partly on its capacity to repackage itself. This ambitious new history recounts the politics of cricket around the world since the Second World War, examining key cultural and political themes, including decolonisation, racism, gender, globalisation, corruption and commercialisation. Part One looks at the transformation of cricket cultures in the ten territories of the former British Empire in the years immediately after 1945, a time when decolonisation and the search for national identity touched every cricket playing region in the world. Part Two focuses on globalisation and the game's evolution as an international sport, analysing: social change and the Ashes; the campaigns for new cricket formats; the development of the women's game; the new breed of coach; the limits to the game's global expansion; and the rise of India as the world's leading cricket power. Cricket: A Political History of the Global Game, 1945-2017 is fascinating reading for anybody interested in the contemporary history of sport.

When Kerry Packer appeared on the cricket scene in the late seventies he revolutionised the game. Today's followers are used to coloured clothing and all the other razzmatazz that is now a part of cricket, but back in 1977 Packer's intervention was divisive and nearly broke the game completely. Players were ostracised by their nations and for a while it looked as if cricket might not survive. Henry Blofeld observed the goings on from his position as both a cricket commentator and writer. In 1978 he compiled a detailed account of the events that unfolded, aided by his interviews with Packer, as well as the deposed English captain Tony Grieg. He witnessed at first hand the Packer Tests in Australia, The Australia-India Test series, MCC play Pakistan and New Zealand, and finally the young Australian side that took on the 'Packer-filled' West Indies. In a mere seven-week period he witnessed all the then six Test-playing nations playing Test cricket. The first time that had been possible. The Man Who Coloured Cricket is Henry Blofeld's detailed document that also shows concern for the human dimensions of the controversy. The varied reaction of the English county players; overseas players; the legal tussles; the complex and surprising character of Packer himself, and the establishment figures with whom he did battle, are strands of the story expertly woven together to make The Man Who Coloured Cricket a dramatic and moving story.

Cricket and broadcasting explores how the significance of radio and television to cricket in England has grown since the beginnings of broadcasting. Since the Second World War cricket has been increasingly shaped by its relationship with broadcasting which has been a force for conservatism and change. Representations of cricket on radio and television have done much to determine levels of interest and participation in the sport. Major changes such as the growth of the limited-overs game, the expansion of international cricket, reforms to County Championship and the rise of sponsorship were dependent on support from television, and income from television has enabled county cricket to survive as the highest form of domestic cricket in England. This accessibly written book will be essential reading for scholars and students of sports history, social and cultural history, and media studies. -- .

Ever since different communities began processes of global migration, sport has been an integral feature in how we conceptualise and experience the notion of being part of a diaspora. Sport provides diasporic communities with a powerful means for creating transnational ties, but also shapes ideas of their ethnic and racial identities. In spite of this, theories of diaspora have been applied sparingly to sporting discourses. Despite W.G. Grace's claim that cricket advances civilisation by promoting a common bond, binding together peoples of vastly different backgrounds, to this day cricket operates strict symbolic boundaries; defining those who do, and equally, do not belong. C.L.R. James' now famous metaphor of looking 'beyond the boundary' captures the belief that, to fully understand the significance of cricket, and the sport's roles in changing and shaping society, one must consider the wider social and political contexts within which the game is played. Contributions to this volume do just that. Cricket acts as their point of departure, but the way in which ideas of power, representation and inequality are 'played out' is unique in each. This book was published as a special issue of Identities.

Of Battenberg, Bombay and Blag is a blood, sweat and beers switch hit across the decades with first-hand accounts and opinion pieces on club cricket, Test matches, the Hundred and IPL. With a decade of club cricket under his belt, Vic Mills heads to Australia in search of adventure only to suffer a severe bout of sledging, but he is one of the few to witness World Series Cricket. With Bodyline almost forgotten, he turns out for the Bar & Bench of Melbourne, the Gentlemen of Ballarat and (his only cap) an Australian Embassy XI in Manila. Chaos ensues in the 1980s as he blags his way into Test grounds around Australia with a building industry union card doubling as a press pass. In the 1990s, he becomes a reluctant reporter, accredited to cricket's press corps courtesy of the Times of India and Jakarta Post. Fast forward to 2009 and Vic is the driving force behind Project Front Foot, a decade-long venture to create a cricket academy for the children of South Asia's largest slum. Today, the project supports refugee cricketers in Europe.

A new edition of Rob Eastaway's classic guide to the rules of cricket. Cricket is one of the world's most popular sports, yet for the uninitiated, its peculiar laws and customs are a mystery. What is a 'silly mid off' and a 'long leg'? How can you be 'lbw'? And how can a match last for five days and still end up as a draw? In this fully updated edition of the classic guide, Rob Eastaway demystifies the jargon and answers the questions you've always wanted to ask. It's also a timely reminder that for the true cricket lover, the game can be absorbing and exciting even when the ball isn't being smashed for six.

'Crazy' Chris Lewis played in thirty-two Test Matches and fifty-three One-Day Internationals for England. At one point he was regarded as one of the best all-round cricketers the country has ever produced. However, feeling at odds with the middle-class nature of the sport, he regularly courted controversy when off the field - and the tabloids happily lapped it up. His naming of England players involved in a match-fixing scandal led to his early retirement at the age of just 30. After this, he withdrew from the limelight until, in 2008, he was arrested for importing cocaine from the Caribbean and sentenced to thirteen years in prison. In Crazy, Lewis recounts his remarkable, redemptive story, from his arrival in England from Guyana, through his colourful cricketing career, his arrest and subsequent trial, his time in prison and how he finally put his life back together.

Between 1967-69 Henry Blofeld was fortunate to witness cricket on three continents. He followed the great West Indies side captained by Garry Sobers through its home series against England - to the 1968-9 Australian tour, and finally their early summer '69 tour of England. Two main themes are explored throughout: The gradual demise of the West Indian side that included the likes of Lance Gibbs, Basil Butcher and Deryck Murray - but which also saw the emergence of future greats such as Clive Lloyd - and the link between a country's topography, style and endemic characteristics with the type of cricket it plays. These threads are skilfully woven together to highlight great cricketing moments and analyse the humour and style of both the Australians and West Indians with thoughtful insight.

Essential writings about cricket by the essential cricket commentator. '"Essential" is a big word in terms of ambition, but the contents of this book were essential in their time to the writer - but, while he cannot claim that they will be that to a reader, he wishes everyone who does read them something of the pleasure he had from writing them.' John Arlott, from the Preface Across a broadcasting career of some thirty-four years, the late John Arlott's commentating on cricket, above all on 'Test Match Special', earned him a popularity and affection unmatched by any who followed him. As Ian Botham noted, 'He was Cricket, there has never been a commentator like him and there never will be.' This book collects together his writings on cricket and cricketers across forty years. It contains pen portraits of the game's famous and not so famous figures, as well as jottings, diary entries and articles written for, among others, 'The Cricketer', 'Wisden Cricket Monthly' and the 'Guardian'. The qualities of his commentary that endeared him to listeners - articulate, leisurely, unfussy, but with a turn of phrase that was almost poetic - are all to be found here. For admirers of Arlott himself, and for anyone who cares about cricket, THE ESSENTIAL ARLOTT is essential reading.

*Standard hardback edition* The 158th edition of the most famous sports book in the world - published every year since 1864 - contains some of the world's finest sports writing, and reflects on an unprecedented year dominated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Writers include Lawrence Booth, Sir Garfield Sobers, Ebony Rainford-Brent, Gideon Haigh, Andy Zaltzman, Tom Holland, Duncan Hamilton, Robert Winder, Matthew Engel, Scyld Berry, Derek Pringle, Jack Leach and James Anderson. As usual, Wisden includes the eagerly awaited Notes by the Editor, the Cricketers of the Year awards, and the famous obituaries. And, as ever, there are reports and scorecards for every Test, together with forthright opinion, compelling features and comprehensive records. "There can't really be any doubt about the cricket book of the year, any year: it's obviously Wisden" Andrew Baker in The Daily Telegraph @WisdenAlmanack

A great depression, worsening Anglo-Australian relations, the declining British Empire and the challenge from an Australia striving to find a national identity are the context which explain bodyline and its repercussions. Bodyline was a watershed in the history of cricket and politics were publicly seen as part of sport. This book offers a radical reappraisal of bodyline which challenges the official interpretations of the events, and places them in a unique social and political context. .

'The best book on captaincy, written by an expert' - Mike Atherton Mike Brearley is one of the most successful cricket captains of all time, and, in 1981, he captained the England team to the momentous Ashes series victory against Australia. In The Art of Captaincy, his study on leadership and motivation, he draws directly on his experience of man-managing a team, which included a pugnacious Ian Botham and Geoffrey Boycott, to explain what it takes to be a leader on and off the field. Giving an insight into both his tactical understanding of the game, as well as how to get a group of individuals playing as a team in order to get the best out of them, The Art of Captaincy is a classic handbook on how to generate, nurture and inspire success. With a foreword by former England player and BBC commentator Ed Smith, to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of its first publication, and an afterword by director Sam Mendes, The Art of Captaincy remains urgently relevant for cricket fans and business leaders alike. Covering the ability to use intuition, resourcefulness, clear-headedness and the importance of empathy as a means of achieving shared goals, Brearley's seminal account of captaincy is both the ultimate blueprint for creating a winning mind set, but also shows how the lessons in the sporting arena can be applied to any walk of personal and professional life.

Ever since different communities began processes of global migration, sport has been an integral feature in how we conceptualise and experience the notion of being part of a diaspora. Sport provides diasporic communities with a powerful means for creating transnational ties, but also shapes ideas of their ethnic and racial identities. In spite of this, theories of diaspora have been applied sparingly to sporting discourses. Despite W.G. Grace's claim that cricket advances civilisation by promoting a common bond, binding together peoples of vastly different backgrounds, to this day cricket operates strict symbolic boundaries; defining those who do, and equally, do not belong. C.L.R. James' now famous metaphor of looking 'beyond the boundary' captures the belief that, to fully understand the significance of cricket, and the sport's roles in changing and shaping society, one must consider the wider social and political contexts within which the game is played. Contributions to this volume do just that. Cricket acts as their point of departure, but the way in which ideas of power, representation and inequality are 'played out' is unique in each. This book was published as a special issue of Identities.

Bill Edrich was regarded as one of the exciting cricket discoveries of his generation. Playing for Middlesex at county level, Edrich surged onto the England scene in 1938 when he scored 1,000 runs. This book relates the story behind this achievement and distils the measure of Edrich's courage as a cricketer.

In this strikingly original work, cultural critic Jonathan Dollimore once again demonstrates his remarkable ability to take on the complex and reveal its relevance with eloquence and grace.
Death, Desire and Loss in Western Culture is a rich testament to our eternal preoccupation with the tangled web of death and desire.
An immensely important book, this is a challenge to the way we understand desire, sexuality, and the very notion of identity.