Temperatures and tempers were rising in the spring of 1990. Four weeks before the UK’s hottest start to May of the 20th century, thousands rioted on the streets in protest at the poll tax, as Margaret Thatcher’s iron grip on power loosened. By late November the prime minister was gone, Geoffrey Howe’s resignation speech in the Commons proving to be the final nail in the coffin.
A controversial new ball, made-to-order straw-coloured-pitches and a sweltering summer conspired to produce a record-breaking year for the bat in 1990. Thirty years on, Jo Harman speaks to the batsmen who filled their boots and bowlers who tried their best to stop them.
“It is rather like sending your opening batsmen to the crease only for them to find, the moment the first balls are bowled, that their bats have been broken before the game by the team captain,” said the former chancellor, referring to Thatcher’s attitude towards British negotiations in Europe.
David Ward was another batsman enjoying a golden summer. Surrey’s hard-hitting right-hander had been in and out of the side since scoring a century on his first-class debut in 1985 but was buoyed after being told he would start the season as wicketkeeper, guaranteeing him a first-team spot. A century against Oxford University got him up and running before he notched another against a Hampshire attack led by Malcolm Marshall in his next match. Ward finished the summer with 2,072 first-class runs at 76.74, signing off the season with two double-hundreds in his last five knocks.
“Everybody says the ball was the main reason for the run glut,” says Ward. “And I didn’t get too many years where I averaged that sort of level. But I like to think that I played quite well. If it was just the slightly smaller seam which produced a more batter-friendly year, why didn’t everybody get millions of runs? As someone who did get some runs, that’s my stance and I’m sticking to it!”
“When you’re going well, you don’t think about it,” says Ward. “You just go out and bat. When you’re going badly the windows are up as you’re driving out the gate, the radio’s off, you keep replaying how you got out. But when the sun’s shining and you’ve got some runs, the radio’s on and the window’s open, and you’re just enjoying your drive home.
“The first game of the following season I asked Stewie [Alec Stewart] what number I was batting and he said No.6. I said, ‘I’ve just got 2,000 runs last year’. ‘That was last year,’ he replied. Normal service resumed.”
First published in issue 30 of Wisden Cricket Monthly. You can subscribe to Wisden Cricket Monthly here.
