Test Cricket Tours - India to England 1952

Test Cricket Tours - India to England 1952

Tour of England 1952 Captain: Vijay Hazare

India’s fifth official Test tour

Fourth Test-playing tour of England by India

(April - September 1952)

The Indian selectors were deprived of the services of Vijay Merchant and Vinoo Mankad, who made themselves unavailable for this tour. However, they did not choose two other great cricketers, Amarnath and Mushtaq Ali, though both were willing to go to England. Merchant resisted pressure persuading him not to retire; the selectors wanted him to captain the team but he was suffering from an injury to his shoulder. Mankad, their second choice, was already committed to a season in the Lancashire League, so the leadership fell on Vijay Hazare, the least suited to it.

The tourists asked George Duckworth, manager of Commonwealth sides in India, to act as 'guide and mentor' for the side.

India had beaten England for the first time (at Madras) in the 1951-52 series and expected to do well, but were outclassed by England and became very defensive in trying to avoid defeat.

The Indians lost the first three Test matches heavily and avoided defeat in the fourth only because two days were lost to bad weather. England's new fast bowler Fred Trueman, on debut, was fearsomely fast, and the Indians played with what has been described as "hysterical uneasiness against pace". By the time of the third Test, the batting line-up had become demoralised. The team’s batting totals were 58 and 82 at Old Trafford and 98 (having been 5 for 6) at The Oval before the rain came to save them from another defeat.

Other Indian tours

Previous tour

Australia 1947-48

Next tour

West Indies 1952-53

Next England tour

1959

Members of the Test tour party (17 + 1)

Opening batsmen: Pankaj Roy, Datta Gaekwad.

Middle-order batsmen:, Vijay Hazare, Coimbatarao Gopinath, Polly Umrigar, Hemu Adhikari , Vijay Manjrekar

Wicket-keepers:Madhav Mantri, Probir Sen.

All-rounders: Vinoo Mankad, Dattu Phadkar.

Spinners: Ghulam Ahmed, Sadu Shinde, Chandu Sarwate, Hiralal Gaekwad.

Fast bowlers: Nirode Chowdhury, Gulabrai Ramchand, Ramesh Divecha

H R Adhikari	Sv	32	RHB

N R Chowdhury	Bn	29	RM

R V Divecha	B	24	RFM

D K Gaekwad	Ba	23	RHB

H G Gaekwad	Hk	23	SLA

Ghulam Ahmed	Hd	30	OB

C D Gopinath	Ms	22	RHB

V S Hazare	Ba	37	RHB

V L Manjrekar	B	20	RHB

M K Mantri	B	30	WK

D G Phadkar	B	36	RHB RFM

G S Ramchand	B	24	RFM

Pankaj Roy	Bn	24	RHB opener

C T Sarwate	Hk	31	OB

P Sen	Bn	26	reserve WK

S G Shinde	B	28	LBG

P R Umrigar	Gj	26	RHB (RM)

Zonal representation

C: Central (2), E: East (3), N: North (1), S: South (2), W: West (9)

Ranji Trophy teams

Ba - Baroda (2)

Bn - Bengal (3)

B - Bombay (6)

Gj - Gujarat (1)

Hk - Holkar (2)

Hd - Hyderabad (1)

Ms - Madras (1)

Sv - Services (1)

Average age of team at time 7of first Test match

(5 June 1952) :

27 yrs 2 months.

Test Appearances made before the tour

Hazare 18, Mankad 18, Adhikari 13, Phadkar 12, Sen 10, Sarwate 9, Umrigar 6, Ghulam Ahmed 5, Roy 5, Shinde 5, Gopinath 3, Choudhury 2, Divecha 2, Manjrekar 2, Mantri 1, D K Gaekwad 0, H G Gaekwad 0, Ramchand 0.

Tour Officials

Pankaj Gupta	Tour Manager
N Karmarkar	Cricket manager
William Ferguson	Scorer / baggage

Selectors

Homi N Contractor (chairman), M Dutta Ray, C K Nayudu, with Vijay Hazare in an advisory role.

Selection

The selectors firstly agreed on ten players to tour - Adhikari, Chowdhury, Ghulam, Gopinath, Hazare, Phadkar, Ramchand, Roy, Sen and Umrigar. But the Chairman was absent unwell when the committee met later in Calcutta, so they finalised the squad using a telephone link.

Unavailable: On 16 February 1952 it was decided that Vinoo Mankad's services were not required for the tour, saying it was because he was engaged to play for Haslingden in the Lancashire League. However skipper Hazare asked the Board permission to use Mankad in all the Test matches. Haslingden refused and Mankad missed the first Test until persuasion by manager Gupta led to Mankad's release - for which Sir Herbert Merrett, President of Glamorgan CCC, paid a cash sum to secure the release.

Tour Party Announced : 19 March 1952.

Datta Gaekwad was named, if the Board of Control would allow a 17th player (which they did).

Not selected /Stand-bys : S K Girdhary (Bn), D H Shodhan (Guj), P G Joshi (Mh), M Rege (Mh).

Time between selection and departure from India

33 days

(19 March - 21 April)

Travel

Calcutta Q London

The West Zone players left Bombay for Calcutta on 18 April. The kit and equipment had already been sent ahead by sea. The team flew out of Dum Dum Airport, Calcutta, in a specially chartered Skymaster on the morning of 21 April on the 30-hour flight, via Karachi and Basra, to London. They landed in a heavy shower at Heathrow Airport on the afternoon of 22 April.

Mankad (with Sohoni, Gul Mohammad and Nimbalkar) sailed to England for the league cricket season, joining the 'Stratheden' when the ship passed through Bombay on 20 March, carrying the West Indian professionals back to England from their New Zealand tour.

Time spent in England

147 days

(22 April - 16 September)

On-tour selection committee

Hazare (captain), Adhikari (vice-captain), Phadkar.

Reinforcements

V M H Mankad

RHB opener SLA

V M H Mankad was made available by his contracted club for the three Test matches.

Fixtures/Results

a	† Osterley	Indian Gymkhana XII	Drawn
b	Worcester	Worcestershire	Drawn
c	The Oval	Surrey	Lost 141 r
d	Leicester	Leicestershire	Drawn
e	Cambridge	Cambridge University	Drawn
f	Lord's	M.C.C.	Drawn
g	Oxford	Oxford University	Won 9 w
h	Ilford	Essex	Drawn
i	Taunton	Somerset	Drawn
j	Cardiff	Glamorgan	Drawn
k	HEADINGLEY	ENGLAND First Test	LOST 7 w
l	† Dublin	Gentlemen of Ireland	Won inns 9
m	† Belfast	Gentlemen of Ireland	Drawn
n	LORD'S	ENGLAND Second Test	LOST 8w
o	† Gillingham	Combined Services	Won 9 w
p	Manchester	Lancashire	Won 10 w
q	†Sunderland	Durham	Drawn
r	Nottingham	Nottinghamshire	Drawn
s	Chesterfield	Derbyshire	Drawn
t	Sheffield	Yorkshire	Drawn
u	MANCHESTER	ENGLAND Third Test	LOST inns 207 r
v	Blackpool	Commonwealth XI	Drawn
w	The Oval	Surrey	Won 6 w
x	Northampton	Northamptonshire	Drawn
y	Swansea	Glamorgan	Drawn
z	Edgbaston	Warwickshire	Drawn
a’	Cheltenham	Gloucestershire	Won 6 w
b’	THE OVAL	ENGLAND Fourth Test	DRAWN
c’	Hove	Sussex	Lost 6 w
d’	Lord's	Middlesex	Drawn
e’	Canterbury	Kent	Drawn
f’	Bournemouth	Hampshire	Drawn
g’	Hastings	England XI	Drawn
h’	† Norwich	Minor Counties	Drawn
I’	Scarborough	T.N.Pearce's XI	Drawn

† not first-class

Time spent in England before First Test:

44 days

(22 April - 5 June)

Test appearances on tour

4 - Ghulam Ahmed, Hazare, Manjrekar, Phadkar, Ramchand, Roy, Umrigar.

3 - Adhikari, Mankad.

2 - Divecha, Mantri, Sen, Shinde.

1 - D K Gaekwad, Gopinath.

0 - Chowdhury, H G Gaekwad, Sarwate.

Highlights

• India lost 4 wickets before scoring a run in the second innings of the first Test match at Headingley.

• Vijay Hazare (56) and Dattu Phadkar (64) then set about repairing the innings with a stand of 105.

• Vinoo Mankad's wonderful all-round performance of 72 and 184 opening the batting and

bowling figures of 73-24-196-5 and 24-12-35-0 when called up for the second Test at Lord's.

• Mankad and Hazare made a partnership of 211 at Lord's, a third wicket record at the time.

Tour Summary

	P	W	L	D	Aban
Test Matches	4	0	3	1	-
Other first-class matches	25	4	2	19	-
ϯ Minor matches	6	2	0	4	-
All Matches	35	6	5	24	-

Return to India

Tilbury T Bombay

‘Chusan’

On the afternoon of 16 September 1952 the team sailed from Tilbury docks on the 'Chusan', together with the Indians who had been playing league cricket and the Indian cycling team from the Helsinki Olympic Games.

The ship reached Bombay on 30 September.

Time away from India

162 days (21 April to 30 September

Finances

The tour made a profit of £11 000.

As a sequel to the profits accruing, a special bonus of Rs 1000 was paid to each member of the Indian team in England and an honorarium of Rs 2500 to the manager Mr Gupta.

Published accounts of the tour

"Rivals in the Sun" (1952) by Raju Bharatan [Popular Book Depot]

Postscript