IN THE glorious summer of 1959, England played a five Test match series against a good Indian team which included fine cricketers like Umrigar, Gupte, Borde and Nadkani, all of whom played as professionals in the Lancashire League.
Yet England won the series 5-0 simply because they had top class cricketers. The likes of May, Cowdrey, Barrington, Graveney, Parks, Evans, Illingworth, Lock, Trueman, and MJK Smith - the Warwickshire batsman who scored over 3,000 runs that summer yet failed to command a regular England place.
Plus the Lancashire trio of Brian Statham, Tom Greenough and Geoff Pullar who scored 131 on his England debut in the Old Trafford Test.
Now, in 1999, England have capitulated against a New Zealand team which I rate on a par with the 1959 Indian team. What is the reason for England's sad decline over the past 40 years?
JOHN PORTER, Thwaites Road, Oswaldtwistle.
Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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