Illy was also a highly canny bowler. For instance, if Jack Birkenshaw was bowling you knew it was a totally flat wicket, whereas if Illy was on you knew it was either turning square or it was the last over before lunch. The latter case backfired on him quite badly in a match against Sussex, when he duly appeared for his ritual 1-1-0-0 but came off the field, wearing a slightly bewildered expression, with something closer to 1-0-22-0. The batsman in question was Javed Miandad with whom, it later transpired, Raymond had had an altercation a year or so previously, and called him something fairly unpleasant. Raymond had long since forgotten this, but Javed had not, so we spent a rib-clutching five minutes before lunch watching Javed charging down the pitch, and Illy peering – with a completely bemused expression – at one ball after another vanishing over the sightscreen. Getting hit for six did not amuse Illy at the best of times, and whenever teams came to Leicester in those days, they generally required a pair of binoculars to make out the boundary rope – except, that is, for the bigger games, when the sponsors (this is pre-executive box era) would pitch tents on the outfield, hence, shorter boundaries. Raymond used to play hell about this, and in one Sunday League match the sight of two consecutive deliveries dropping into the coleslaw in the Bostik guests’ tent proved too much for him. For the next couple of minutes spectators were treated to the fairly unusual sight of the Leicestershire captain waving his fist at the committee balcony and giving them a fearful haranguing. Even so, I think he managed to drag himself into the tent for a sponsored Pimms or two afterwards.
I think it’s fair to say that when misfortune struck, Raymond was not so quick to see the funny side of it, but the old boy was not without a sharp turn of repartee on occasions. Leicestershire did not have a strict dress code for players in those days, but they worked roughly on the basis of smart casuals. No tie and jacket required, but a reasonable appearance was demanded. I slightly tarnished my record one day at Trent Bridge when I woke up in my customary bleary-eyed state in the flat at Leicester and groped around in semi-darkness for a pair of shoes. What I had put on was one black shoe, and one brown. This didn’t go un-noticed by the captain, and there then followed a longish lecture on the standards of dress expected from young professionals. I can’t remember the exact words, but ‘smarten up you scruffy sod’ was the basic message.
I fancied there might be some mileage in this lecture, so, having recently acquired a dark blue dinner suit, I took it with me to our next match in Taunton. In the relaxed atmosphere of breakfast before a Sunday League game I strode into the dining room. Suit, bow-tie, polished shoes (both black), the works. Raymond glanced up from his plate, gave me the once over, and said: ‘Bloody hell, Gower. Have you just come in?’ Whether he meant this as a joke, or whether he was being serious, I’m not totally sure. You rarely could tell with Raymond. We got on very well, and he did try to nurture me through, as did most of the senior players, the likes of Davison, Dudleston, Tolchard, Steele and Micky Norman. They were a good crew to be with, and we also happened to be a very good side, and all this worked in my favour in those early days.
Those first three or four years under Illy were as good a grounding as a young player could have, and I made the transition from an averagely talented player to a slightly better than average player with a decent idea of what professional cricket is all about. It was certainly different than what I had imagined it would be like, and there were one or two instances of the talented but wet-behind-the-ears-public-schoolboy running into a bit of hostility from the hardened pro trying to make a living on a demanding circuit. I remember opening the innings in a championship game against Surrey at the Oval and timing a few cover drives early on against the new ball, which appeared to draw a fair amount of steam from Robin Jackman’s ears. He has always been a bit volatile, and the sight of this angelic looking youngster creaming him around the Oval with no apparent effort did not do a lot for his sense of humour. He wanted to know, in fairly blunt terms, whether I was interested in playing the game properly. This did enough to unsettle me and I was lbw not long afterwards. It’s the sort of thing a batsman eventually comes to terms with, and occasionally learns to enjoy, but it was all rather new to me at that time and I didn’t quite know how to keep my concentration in the face of it. In a nutshell, I was beginning to learn that county cricket was a job as opposed to a recreation.
There were also, contrary to popular opinion, one or two recorded cases of nerves. Before scoring that 89 not out against the West Indies, I remember downing a scotch in the pub next to the ground in the company of the landlady – Roberts and Daniel were sharing the new ball, so it seemed appropriate to try and settle the stomach. Hazel was her name, loved by all, and the place was never quite the same when the brewery moved her on. I did a certain amount of hopping around during that knock. The old duck-hook came out several times – the sort you play when you start going for the hook and end up having to bail out in a hurry when you realize that the ball is homing in on the eyebrows rather more rapidly than anticipated. Chris Balderstone got 125 and 98, which got him into the Test side. As for myself, I was starting to get a few honourable mentions in more influential organs than the Loughborough Echo (proud though I was of earlier cuttings snipped from that paper), although mention of me in connection with the England side did not really begin to build up until the following year, 1977.
I overheard Illy voicing his opinion around the dressing room that I would be playing for England within the next couple of years, and coming from him I thought that was as good a recommendation as you could get. In subsequent years, when he appeared to be recommending sons-in-law and prospective sons-in-law for the captaincy of Yorkshire, England, and the Universe, I would have questioned his judgement a touch more than I did then, but at the time it was a pretty impressive reference. By the end of that summer, there had been enough speculation from other quarters to make me wonder, anxious even, about that winter’s tour to Pakistan and New Zealand. Ian Botham was now in the side and it seemed to be a question of whether someone like Mike Gatting or myself might make the squad as a young batsman, taken along to gain some experience. As it turned out, Gatt made it and I didn’t. I was disappointed because I had actually become quite excited about the speculation, but it soon wore off and I was happy to make yet another Derrick Robins’ tour, this time to the Far East. I developed my friendship with Chris Cowdrey out there, behaved pretty poorly, but also got in some decent cricket in Malaysia, Hong Kong, Singapore and Sri Lanka. From there it was a short hop to Perth where I played club cricket for the remainder of the winter, with a fair amount of success, and did well enough in the early summer of 1978 (one of the few years I’ve started off a season in good form) to get myself into the England side for the one-dayers against Pakistan. I scored a century in the second of the two matches, and was then selected for the first Test at Birmingham. So I had already had the settling effect of having played at international level when I made my Test debut, and although hitting your first ball for four would have to rank as a reasonable way to launch a career, the Pakistani attack at that time could hardly be equated with that of the West Indies when G. Hick arrived at the wicket in 1991.
Imran wasn’t playing, barred through Kerry Packer, and had he delivered the same ball on the same length as dear old Liaquat Ali, or Liquid as we came to know him, they might have been picking bits of me out of the fence as opposed to the ball. Mind you, I might not have been quite so keen to unveil the pull shot first ball against an Imran or an Andy Roberts. I might have been young, but I had learned a few of the facts of life by now. I did actually wonder to myself at the time whether I should have played the shot, even against Liquid. First ball, first Test, probably not the done thing, and if it had gone straight up in the air it might have caused a bit of a stir – Brian Johnston choking to death on his chocolate cake I shouldn’t wonder. But as I remember, it was just an instinctive shot to a bad ball. Eventually I did hit one straight up in the air, having made fifty-odd, relaxed a little and done something silly when a century was there for the taking. Some might say ‘So what’s new?’
Whenever I have made fifty in my career, I’ve invariably said to myself, ‘Okay, head down, let’s get fifty more.’ The trouble is, I’ve always had to work to say it. It’s a failing, simple