Derek Underwood was my bowling hero when I was a boy. On unforgiving wickets like this one at The Oval it was his metronomic accuracy and relentlessness that were his greatest strengths. But the very greatest of batsmen could intimidate him. Viv Richards did so. His skill and confidence caused Underwood problems.
In a county game against Warwickshire in 1986when Deadly was 41 he had figures of 35 overs 29 maidens 11 runs 7 wickets. He was a superb bowler. In fairness not many batsmen got on top of Underwood in test cricket in the mid 70s apart from Richards who destroyed most of them. Signing for Packer basically finished Derek in test cricket even though he played another dozen games or so after peace broke out
@@JP1234815 Yes of course but I wonder whether Underwood would have continued to play Test Cricket had he not gone to South Africa. My own hunch is he probably wouldnt have. Think England would have looked to rebuild anyway with a new captain etc
@@dlamiss England have a long history of bringing 'older' players back to shore up their side. 'deadly' would have been superb to throw the ball to against New Zealand in '83. If the groundsman had done some liberal watering of the playing area beforehand (especially if a warm sunny day was forecast) the temptation would be too great!!!
@@JP1234815 Possibly yes. Maybe he may have become a horses for courses guy but the fact he only played one test match out of 12 in the summers of 1980 and 1981 and had figures of one for over 100 in the game he DID play suggests maybe the selectors could have been starting to look elsewhere
Jim Laker getting his facts wrong again!! Saying this was WI's highest test score ( 24:17). When Sir Garry Sobers scored his 365 not out v Pakistan the WI scored 790/3 declared
Bob Willis became a better bowler after he straightened his run up. He still had no ball problems, but he was less likely to slant the ball in to the batsman's pads (a free hit for top class batsmen as Viv Richards shows all to clearly here).
@@dlamiss Wasn't it John Snow who advised him to straighten his run up? John also helped Imran Khan in changing his run up and Dennis Lillee said he helped him too. This begs the question of why the then TCCB didn't sign John up as a bowling coach in the early 80's!
Having for once picked a reasonable pace attack in the previous game at Headingley , which would possibly have resulted in victory if they'd got the batting selection right the selectors reverted to type here and came up with the most feeble and defensive choice of bowlers imaginable with the exception of the great RGD Willis. The humiliating outcome was inevitable.
Snow and Ward were both injured for this match. Apart from Bob Willis England didn't have any other genuine quick bowlers to pick (Ken Higgs was the only other option - but he was 39 at the time).
@@WG1807 None of them could be considered 'genuinely quick' - ie over 90 mph. Hendrick, who played at Old Trafford was early 80 mph while Chris Old, who played in the 1st 2 test matches was around 85 mph. John Lever made his debut for England in the ODI's after the test match series bowled about 85 mph too.
@@JP1234815 Yes indeed, not express pace, but quicker than the medium trundlers on offer here, Willis excepted. Having said that, it was a pitch full of runs on a lightning outfield. Two double hundreds in the match and a collection of other good scores. A bowler's graveyard in most regards.
