This particular edition was significant as it included a celebration of the 61st birthday of Neville Cardus, written by the great man himself. The piece included a photo of Cardus bowling in 1938, when aged 50 but looking somewhat older. Cardus relates that he was transformed from being an association football fan in 1899 (“soccer” being apparently a term confined to the upper classes at that time) to being a die-hard cricket fan by the following summer, but that he couldn’t remember what specifically had caused such a transformation to take place, although he had initially begun watching cricket to poke fun at the ‘la-di-da’ types who played such a soft game. In the process of this reminiscence, he introduced this reader to a word with which I was not previously familiar, i.e. ‘contumely”, as in ‘as we lay on the grass we shouted contumely at the players’, which means (for those like me who weren’t previously aware) insolent or insulting language – no doubt CW’s own Neville Cardus already knew that.

Cardus grew up watching cricket while firmly entrenched in its Golden Age and the impact of that period clearly shaped his future writing career, as he introduced a romance to cricket writing which was previously absent. He describes in detail a match which took place one Whit Monday between Lancashire and Kent, when the visitor’s opener Cuthbert ‘Pinky’ Burnup, who incidentally was capped for England at football, rescued Kent from 13/3 to 401/6 by scoring exactly 200 not out – in Cardus’ opinion, ‘this day could be quoted as a kind of graph of the temperature of first-class cricket of the Golden Age’.

CB Fry acheived a feat in 1901 which has since been equalled, by Don Bradman and Mike Procter, but never broken, that of six consecutive First-Class hundreds. By 1950, however, Cardus had this to say: ‘We have waxed fat on records now; the currency has depreciated. We have lost the blessings and grace of innocence.’ He goes on: ‘I have no use for those who live in the past’ while reprising one of his more evocative comparisons, which he usually applied to Bradman, of the aeroplane and swallow to illustrate the difference between ‘the mechanical and the vital.’

Cardus had more to say about the state of cricket in 1950 as compared to that enjoyed during the Golden Age: ‘County captains should order any batsman to get out if he is not scoring quickly enough, and goes protectively into a shell because he is approaching yet another “century”.’ Interesting use of quotations there. As a shining example of the type of batsman he favoured, he holds up Ranji: ‘an innings by him was a tribute from the Orient to the glory of the Victorian sunset and the dawn that came up like thunder, too soon to blaze down, with the Edwardian succession’; I honestly can’t imagine any other cricket writer coming up with such a description, or being allowed to get away with writing it for that matter.

As far as his opinion of the best ever, Cardus rates Hobbs as the best all-round batsman he’d ever seen, Trumper the most gallant, the aforementioned Ranji the most magical, Macartney the most impertinent, JT Tyldesley the most brilliant on a sticky wicket and at his best a stroke player in a thousand, Woolley the ‘most lordly in effortless power’, Spooner the most courteous, Leyland the most obstinate, Compton the most likeable, George Gunn the most original, Hammond the most magnificent, Maclaren the most majestic, while it is no doubt Cardus’ romantic view which instructs his estimation of Bradman as the most ‘ruthlessly reliable’.

Of the men at the other end of the pitch, his favourite among the fast men were McDonald, Larwood and Walter Brearley, while he finds praise also for SF Barnes, Tate, O’Reilly, Grimmett, Blythe, Rhodes, Trumble, and Noble…’ after all, as the photo above confirms, he was ‘in my way, a bowler myself!”

As enjoyable as the birthday piece was, the second piece by Cardus in the same publication is decidedly more eye-opening to modern readers. Entitled ‘No Ashes, but Plenty of Fire”, this piece features his preview of the upcoming West Indies tour of England. It is prefaced by a great photo of a youthful looking Frank Worrell, as well as Everton Weekes and Robert Christiani, all of whom had made their debuts when the England team had toured the Caribbean a couple of years earlier.

Cardus performs a service to his readers by introducing them to a number of early West Indian cricketers, including George Challenor, CA Olivierre and Lebrun Constantine, father of Learie. However in so doing, he employs one or two phrases which are somewhat jarring to the modern reader. While it is perhaps harsh to judge those of a bygone age against our relatively recently accepted, but hopefully more enlightened standards of inclusion, nonetheless there are some eye-opening sentiments expressed in this piece, such as ‘large smiles redolent of water melons’ and, in describing the friendliness of Derek Sealy (at least I assume that is who ‘J Sealey’ refers to), making a reference to ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’. I realise I may be displaying a little too much sensitivity, however Cardus also warns against the ‘Old Adam” breaking out which, for those of you unfamiliar with the phrase, is referring to humans in their unredeemed state. Finally, a precursor of Tony Grieg 25 years later, though perhaps not quite as forthright, can be found in Cardus’ summing up of the lack of readiness of the 1928 visit of the West Indies cricket team to England, noting they were too ‘naive in its endeavour and changes of mood…a sudden blow of bad luck! – the outlook darkened at once.’ Different times indeed.

Cardus does however offer Headley as possibly being the greatest batsman of all time, ahead even of Bradman, whilst also crediting him with toughening the fibre of West Indies cricket – ‘Headley lent a contemporary and cosmopolitan sophistication to the sound foundations laid down almost single-handedly by Challenor.’

As many readers will know, it was during the 1950 tour that Sonny Ramadhin and Alfred Valentine (referred to in his article as ‘A Ramadhin and V Valentine’) laid waste to the cream of England’s batting; it is possible that the latter was confusing Vincent Valentine, who played a couple of Tests before the war, but as our resident cricket tragic Martin points out, Ramadhin was never endowed with a Christian name and was dubbed ‘Sonny’, though he was also apparently assigned the initials ‘KT’ by an over-officious customs official prior to an Atlantic crossing. It may have been the sight of Valentine which suggested the comment ‘It is another sign of the greater introspection that is coming to West Indies cricket, as it is drawn into the circle of a world “civilisation”, that their players are taking to spectacles.’

Nonetheless Cardus signs off with ‘Every lover of cricket will rejoice to see the West Indies holding their own with our best’ – well, they certainly managed that.

As time went on and I started to generate my own income (paper round) I began to specialise, my then part-time occupation allowing me discounted (not necessarily of the five-finger kind) access to Shoot, The Cricketer and Athletics Weekly, which coincided with the end of my dad's subscription to World Sports. What I wasn't aware of at that time was that World Sports had already been available for quite some time, so it was with great delight recently that I found on eBay a number of back issues for sale.

As a result of that procurement, I would like to present in a series of articles a review of some of the great cricket pieces which this gem of a magazine offered its readers. Writers of the calibre of Denzil Batchelor, Bruce Lockhart, SC Griffith and the great man himself, Neville Cardus, delighted those of the cricketing faith who were fortunate enough to get their hands on this monthly sports review. There were many other items of interest, such as features on women's sport like "How far should women run?", plus stop-frame coaching pieces featuring Lindsey Hasset's batting and Jack Iverson's bowling, as well as a regular cartoon feature with much ancient wisdom from, among others, Fuller Pilch, William Lambert and James Lilywhite.

The oldest edition currently in my possession is from April 1948. This edition opens with a piece by Denzil Batchelor which features the great all-rounder Harold George Owen "Tuppy" Owen-Smith, whose nickname was shortened from the original "Tuppence" and who was capped for his native South Africa at both cricket and rugby. In cricket, he played in just a single five-Test series but his legend was cemented by an innings at Leeds in the third Test – described in the following year's Wisden as “distinctly the most exhilarating member of the last South Africa team to visit this country”, his 129 was enough to help South Africa progress from 172/9 to 275 all out, though this was not enough to prevent England winning by five wickets. Smith was also a useful welterweight boxer, and after his sporting days were done he became a doctor in Cape Town.

In the main cricket piece featured in this edition, Cardus (bylined as “the famous cricket writer and music critic”) was considering that year’s Olympic summer, as well as the upcoming visit of the Australian cricket team, in his piece entitled “Have we lost the fighting spirit?”. The maestro gives us an insight into his character with this opening, which could have been written by our own Martin Chandler – Once or twice, in my young, hot-blooded days, I have hated Yorkshiremen when they have been beating Lancashire, but on the whole, the result of a match seldom remains in my memory…. Not that he takes to sport in a lukewarm or neutral fashion, as he goes on to explain – even an exciting finish appeals to me dramatically – for its own sake, for the stimulation to nerve and imagination that an exciting finish gives us, apart from the question of who wins and who loses Truly a lover of cricket for its own sake, though he goes on to caution I want my cricket hot with Yorkshire relish…I want all the rigour of the game, with no laggards and no bowing-or-scraping, or a cheery ‘Well tried” to some fool who has missed a tolerably easy chance-at very deep long on. As Yorkshire’s Roy Kilner opined What’s use of oompires in Yorksheer and Lankysheer match? They never ‘ears owt. What we want in Yorksheer and Lankysheer matches is no oompires-and fair cheatin’ all round. Indeed.

Cardus notes the way the Grand Old Man played the game – WG Grace played cricket the right way, the only way. He, most wonderful of record breakers, never set himself to break records, they came only in his stride, so to say, in the stride of his enjoyment. In all the walks of the world, the best way to find ourselves is to lose ourselves Cardus notes that, when Lancashire would travel to Surrey, Ted Macdonald would act as if “Hobbs is mine”, but he would not bowl at the modest fry who came in late. Was this behaviour disdainful and selfish? Nobody desires an individualism in sport that runs to self-exploitation. But from some point of ethics above the ordinary plane I see a certain grandeur in Macdonald’s abnegation, his surrender of his own destructive power in the presence of the weak, the anonymous, the not-worth-getting-out. In Cardus’ opinion, a statue should be erected to Macdonald outside the Parliament House in Canberra, symbolising Australia in all her animal health

Discussing the previous summer and its restoring to health of both cricket and a war-weary nation, Cardus notes Cricket has indeed been unctuous about its powers towards “moral improvement”. We want no more of that. In this Olympic year, and having seen in the previous year the cricket crowds being restored to health by the feats of Compton and others, Cardus appealed to nothing more romantic than man’s love of losing himself in enjoyment-thereby finding himself and the one and true god of sport.

The following month’s edition, May 1948, includes a colour plate featuring a painting of 1947 Sportsman of the Year Denis Compton, though with no indication of the identity of the artist (see above). There is also a fine representation of Ray Lindwall’s action in stop-frame sequence. The main cricket piece is once again penned by Neville Cardus, as he previewed the visit of what would come to be known as Bradman’s Invincibles – After ten years we are about to see Australian cricketers again in England, and for a while we’ll be able to watch a real Test match, every ball a nail in someone’s coffin. Already our pessimists, hereditary lords of compliant and woe and dyspepsia, are lengthening their fine faces in dire presage of England’s defeat. As Cardus noted There is certainly something to be said for the point of view that England will not beat Australia this year until they have got Bradman out tem times. Though England did manage to dismiss him seven times, Bradman averaged “only” 72.57 though, in what was his last series, he was only outscored by Arthur Morris. Indeed, the scene for the series was set in the first Test, when England found herself behind by a massive 344 runs on first innings.

But before this all played out, Cardus was wishing for a wet summer – Bradman has yet to show us sustained mastery on a sticky pitch against a fast bowler, going on to explain how the exploiters of stickies had shifted to the faster end of the bowling spectrum. However, Cardus still feared Bradman was as near to the ball as the sheath to the encased sword…To get him out ten times will come close to the general beggary of wit, invention and resource. He bemoaned the bowling on both sides as mediocre – There is no O’Reilly, no Grimmett…none of them-neither Lindwall, nor Miller, nor Toshack, nor Ring, nor McCool-are in possession of tricks and devices not familiar to any cricketer pretending towards first-class. However, despite the great man’s prognostications, as Wisden noted in 1949, Lindwall’s bowling proved the biggest sngle weapon on either side.

Cardus opined that Compton would be England’s hero, and indeed Compton’s 184 in the first Test seemed to bear that out, and he would go on to average more than 60 in the Tests. However Cardus saw the skipper, Hutton, as England’s mainstay with the bat – our nearest to the Jack Hobbs model.. The great writer also foresaw Doug Wright as possibly England’s trump card, however as it turned out lumbago forced the spinner’s withdrawal from the first Test and an uninspiring 2/123 in the second meant he was not called upon again.

Cardus concluded In any case, there is no room in the present age, with its shadows and uncertainties, for dull, unentertaining sport. Dreary cricket will today be regarded as a waste of time, manpower, money and temper.

Hopefully, despite England’s defeat and the inaccuracies of some of his predictions, the great man was able to lose himself in his enjoyment of cricket, rather than the result.