Tour of  India 1951-52       Captain : Nigel Howard                          

Fortieth official Test tour.

(September 1951 – March 1952)

Second Test-playing tour of India by England

  (previous tour was 1933-34 because the 1939-40tour was cancelled)

M.C.C.’s second visit to India went ahead only because the Australians’ visit in 1952 was deferred by one year. When M.C.C. cancelled the 1949-50 Indian tour because of player overload there was no tour planned for 1951-52 and any future tours to India were subject to the seventeen county clubs giving their full support. Even so, many of England’s leading players declined invitations to make the tour, which left some ill-feeling among Indians who never saw players like Hutton or Bedser.

England’s reserve team was strong enough and won the fourth Test handsomely but India caused a surprise by squaring the series with an emphatic innings’ victory in the final Test. There had been an earlier shock during the month-long visit to Pakistan, too. Here the tourists lost the second of two representative matches, a result which led to Pakistan’s elevation to full membership of the I.C.C. (then called the Imperial Cricket Conference).

M.C.C. were weakened by Poole’s finger injury which kept him out of the team for two months, and by Rhodes’s illness which forced him to return home after he had looked like England’s most effective bowler. The skipper Nigel Howard suffered from a cold which turned into pleurisy, and put him, too, out of the tour after the fourth Test. There were any number of other minor injuries.

Other England tours

Previous Test tour

Australia 1950-51

Next Test tour

West Indies 1953-54

Next tour of  India

1961-62

Members of the Test tour party (16  + 1)

Opening batsmen:  Frank Lowson, Don Kenyon, Jack Robertson

Middle-order batsmen Douglas Carr, Tom Graveney, Nigel Howard, Cyril Poole, Allan Watkins.

Wicket-keeper: Don Brennan, Dick Spooner

Slow bowlers: Malcolm Hilton, Dusty Rhodes, Roy Tattersall

Fast bowlers: Derek Shackleton, Fred Ridgway, Brian Statham.

County representation:

Dy – Derbyshire (2)

Gm - Glamorgan (1)

Gs - Gloucestershire (1)

Ha - Hampshire (1)

La - Lancashire (4)

Kt  -  Kent (1)

Mx - Middlesex (1)

Nt - Nottinghamshire (1)

Wk - Warwickshire (1)

Wo - Worcestershire (1)

Yo - Yorkshire (2)

Average age of  team at time of first Test match

(2 November 1951) 

28 yrs  3 months.

Test Appearances made before the tour

Tattersall 9,  Watkins 7,  Robertson 6,  Statham 3,  Brennan 2,  Hilton 2,  Shackleton 2,  Graveney 1,  Carr 0,  Howard 0,  Leadbeater 0,  Kenyon 0,  Lowson 0,  Poole 0,  Rhodes 0,  Ridgway 0,  Spooner 0.

Tour Officials

Selectors

Norman Yardley (chairman),  Bob Wyatt,  Les Ames,  Freddie Brown.

Selection

The captain and manager were named on 4 July and the vice-captain on 4 August. Wilf Wooler had the chance to lead the side, but he made himself unavailable.

Donald Carr, Don Kenyon and Cyril Poole were not among the originally-named squad of fourteen.

Unavailable : T.E.Bailey, Bedser, F.R.Brown, Compton, W.J.Edrich, Evans, Hutton, Ikin, D.J.Insole, Laker, P.B.H.May, Parkhouse, D.S.Sheppard, Simpson, Trueman,  Wardle,  Washbrook,  W Watson.

Tour party announced : 19 July 1951.

On 26 July  M.C.C. added Donald Carr and Don Kenyon’s names to the group of fourteen previously announced

Withdrawn:. Jack Ikin (Lancashire) because of a back injury. Cyril Poole replaced him.

Time between selection and departure from England

   61 days

 (19 July - 18 September)

Travel

Tilbury     T    Bombay

              ‘Chusan’

Departure from England was on 18 September 1952.

The team sailed from Tilbury in the ‘Chusan’ for Bombay, berthing at Mole Station Quay at 8:30 am on 2 October, one hour ahead of time. The team disembarked as noon approached and motored to the Cricket Club of India.

After the first Test match they flew from New Delhi to Lahore on 8 November for the Pakistan section of the tour, returning to India on 4 December.

For the Ceylon section, M.C.C. travelled from Madras to Colombo on 4 February

Time spent in India, Pakistan and Ceylon

    156  days

(2 October -  6 March)

On-tour selection panel

Nigel Howard (captain),  Donald Carr (vice-captain) and Allan Watkins (decided on board the ship on 21 September).

Reinforcements

At the start of the tour Cyril Poole broke a finger during net practice. Lowson also injured a finger.

Eddie Leadbeater was brought in when ‘Dusty’ Rhodes had to return home with a hernia before the first Test in early November.

When Nigel Howard went down with pleurisy, Donald Carr took over the captaincy. The manager played two innings in Ceylon and batted well (“…stood his ground and played a sterling innings”). Watkins was captain in the final tour match in Galle.

Fixtures/Results

† not first-class

Time spent in India before First Test:   31 days

(2 October - 2 November)

Test appearances on tour

5  -   Ridgway,  Robertson,  Spooner,  Statham,  Tattersall,  Watkins.

4  -   Graveney,  Howard,  Lowson

3  -   Kenyon,  Poole

2  -   Carr,  Hilton,  Leadbeater

1  -   Shackleton

0  -   Brennan,  Rhodes.

Match appearances

T  Test match

x other match 

∙  played for opposition

W won  L lost  D drawn  

N no result   A abandoned  

u unknown result

Highlights

•  Allan Watkins saved England in the first Test at Delhi with an innings of 137*

•  Tom Graveney scored 175 in the second Test at Bombay

•  Watkins hit 80 in the same innings, and then took 3-20 with his left-arm swing.

•  Dick Spooner, opening the innings, scored 92 at Calcutta (3rd Test) while Cyril Poole’s scores were 55 and 69*

•  Spinners Roy Tattersall (6-48) and Malcolm Hilton (4-32)  bowled India out for 121 at Kanpur, and Hilton had 5-61 in the second innings.

•  Jack Robertson (77 and 56) stood defiant as India won by an innings’ margin at Madras.

Tour Summary

Return to England

Colombo   T    Tilbury

              ‘Chusan’

The ‘Chusan’ sailed from Colombo on 6 March 1952, reaching Tilbury on Sat 22 March

Time away from England

  186 days  

(18 September - 22 March)

Finances

Accounts of the Tour

“M.C.C. in India”  by L N Mathur (Raj Hans Publications, Ajmer, 1952)

“India  vs  M.C.C. Tests 1951-52”  by Prof N S Phadke (Anjali Prakashan, Bombay, 1952)

Postscript