Hampshire Through The Decades: 1970s

Hampshire Cricket's historian, Dave Allen, is back with a brand new series - Hampshire Through The Decades - as he looks at some of the best moments from Hampshire's history from each decade following the conclusion of the World War II. 

This week's next instalment sees him take a journey back to the 1970s.

In 1962, reigning Champions Hampshire played 32 Championship matches plus first-class games at Oxford University and against the touring Pakistanis. Ten years later, there were just 20 Championship matches but three one-day competitions as Hampshire played three in the 60-over Gillette Cup, four in the brand new 55-over Benson & Hedges Cup and 16 on Sunday afternoons in the 40-over League sponsored by John Player.

Hampshire’s team was much changed too with only Peter Sainsbury surviving from the 1962 side after the great batsman Roy Marshall retired at the end of the 1972 season. Other recent departures included pace bowlers Bob Cottam and John Holder while Barry Reed and Larry Worrell would play no more for the first team. Captain Richard Gilliat had the challenge of moulding a new side and no one - including the ‘Bookies' offering 66-1 against them winning the Championship - can have anticipated what would occur in 1973 as Hampshire won their second, and to date, last title.

Only 13 men played in the 1973 side, and apart from one Sunday League appearance by John Rice, they played in all the one-day matches as well. The batting was led by the wonderful opening partnership of Richards and Greenidge, followed by David Turner, Gilliat, and Richard Lewis with Andy Murtagh in reserve. The middle order all-rounders were Sainsbury, Trevor Jesty, newly signed Mike Taylor from Notts and wicketkeeper Bob Stephenson, while the greatest surprise was the new opening bowling partnership of Bob Herman (64 wickets) and Tom Mottram (57).

In August, ‘Kiwi’ spin-bowler David O’Sullivan hit a remarkable spell and he and fellow spinner Sainsbury shared 100 wickets over the 20 games at less than 20 runs each. Hampshire won 10 of their 20 matches and were only the second side to go through the season undefeated since Lancashire in 1930.

The key game came at Southampton in early August which they won in two days by seven wickets. 12 months later it seemed there was a repeat event as Hampshire, with the addition of Andy Roberts even stronger than in 1973, led the table until the final game and on the way at Portsmouth, crushed second-place Worcestershire by an innings in two days. But then the rain – and one bad day in Wales – turned against them, Worcestershire had more luck and, unable to play in their final game, Hampshire ended runners-up by just two points.

In 1975 they came very close again but finished third. This brief period was, nonetheless the finest in Hampshire’s Championship history and there was compensation in 1975 and again in 1978 when Gilliat’s team won their first limited-overs titles, the Sunday League. The one mystery with this fine side was how they had failed to reach a Lord’s Final, losing semi-finals in 1975, 1976 & 1978.

Gilliat then retired, a few months after Richards and Roberts had departed during the controversies around Australia’s World Series Cricket – the initiative by TV mogul Kerry Packer, that also involved Greenidge. Herman and Mottram too had played their last games, Stephenson and Taylor were approaching the end, while Sainsbury was now coach. The next decade would begin with new players in a period of significant changes.