Test Cricket Tours - South Africa to England 1960

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Tour of England 1960 Captain: Jackie McGlew

Twelfth official Test tour

Ninth Test-playing tour of England by South Africa

(April - September 1960)

The South African touring side of 1960 were not attractive to watch. The batting was below Test match standard and the bowling relied overmuch on Adcock for penetration and Tayfield for steadiness. If Tayfield was past his best, Adcock was hostile and captured a record number of wickets. Yet England, while inflicting an overwhelming defeat in the Test matches, were neither stretched nor served with serious preparation for the Ashes series next summer.

The young players chosen for the tour party made very little progress and 20 year-old Geoff Griffin's career was brought to an abrupt halt when he was called for throwing in an exhibition match played at the end of the Lord's Test. Griffin had already been called for throwing in South Africa (though not in the season preceding the tour) and on a number of occasions on this tour including England’s only innings in the Lord’s Test. Most commentators knew before the tour that he threw every ball and should never have been selected.

The circumstances which saw Griffin humiliated were the product of levity in an exhibition match played the previous season; in 1959 the Indians had suffered their fifth Test match defeat in a row when the game at The Oval ended before lunch on the fourth day. There was a 22 overs per side exhibition match, which was played in a manner which encouraged the authorities to ensure that all should treat such matches more seriously in future - as umpire Buller indeed did. Griffin did not bowl again on the tour.

In consequence the Australian Board, realising how its 1961 tour could be wrecked if umpires were not going to accept the actions of bowlers like Meckiff, conferred with MCC as a matter of urgency on what constitutes a throw, and ensured that none of the obvious throwers were in their tour party.

South Africa lost the toss in all five Test matches which was an inconvenience but could not account for England winning 3-0 and maintaining a sequence of 23 Tests without losing a match in England. The gloomy weather and poor attendances made the tour South Africa's first in England since 1912 to turn in a financial loss.

Other South African tours

Previous Tour

England 1955

Next tour

Australia 1963-64

Next tour of England

1965

Members of the Test tour party (15)

Opening batsmen Jackie McGlew, Trevor Goddard

Middle-order batsmen Roy McLean, Sid O’Linn, Tony Pithey, Peter Carlstein, Colin Wesley, Jon Fellows-Smith.

Wicket-keepers John Waite, Chris Duckworth

Spin bowlers Athol McKinnon, Hugh Tayfield

Fast bowlers Neil Adcock, Geoff Griffin, Jim Pothecary.

N A T Adcock	T	29	RFM
P R Carlstein	T	21	RHB
C A R Duckworth	R	27	RHB (opener) second WK
J P Fellows-Smith	T	28	RHB (RM)
T L Goddard	N	28	LHB opener LM
G Griffin	N	20	RFM
D J McGlew	N	31	RHB opener (LB) captain
A H McKinnon	EP	27	SLA
R A McLean	N	29	RHB
S O’Linn	T	33	LHB reserve WK
A J Pithey	R	26	RHB
J E Pothecary	WP	26	RFM
H J Tayfield	T	32	OB
J H B Waite	T	30	RHB WK
C Wesley	N	22	LHB

Representation of teams:

EP Eastern Province (1)

N - Natal (5)

R - Rhodesia (2)

T - Transvaal (6)

WP - Western Province (1)

Average age of team at time of first Test match

(9 June 1960):

27 yrs 10 months

Test Appearances made before the tour

Tayfield 32, Waite 31, McLean 28, McGlew 24, Adcock 19, Goddard 15, Pithey 3, Duckworth 2, Carlstein 1, Fellows-Smith 0, Griffin 0, McKinnon 0, O'Linn 0, Pothecary 0, Wesley 0.

Team Officials

A D Nourse	Manager
M MacLennan	Physiotherapist

Selectors

Alan Melville (Transvaal – convenor of selectors), Johnny Lindsay (North-eastern Transvaal). Lindsay Tuckett (Orange Free State), R.C.Wooller (Transvaal).

Selection

Mr Dudley Nourse was named as manager.

After six days of trial matches, Mr G W A Chubb (President of the South African Cricket Association) made the announcement of names in the tour party to a large crowd waiting in front of Kingsmead pavilion.

Unavailable: Peter Heine (back injury), Percy Mansell.

Tayfield more or less came out of retirement to make the tour.

Tour Party Announced : 14 February 1960.

Not selected : .

Time between selection and departure from South Africa

63 days

(14 February to 17 April)

Travel

The team flew from Johannesburg at noon on 17 April 1960, via Kano and Amsterdam to London Airport. They were met by a demonstration of 400 anti-apartheid protesters, including Fenner Brockway MP.

The demonstrations continued throughout the tour. In anticipation of this, MCC had given the South african Board the option of calling off the tour.

Time spent in England

151 days

(17 April - 15 September)

On-tour selection panel

McGlew, Goddard, Waite, Nourse.

Reinforcements

None. When Griffin's tour as a bowler came to an end, he remained on tour as a batsman. Although Mr Geoffrey Chubb, the President of the South African Cricket Association issued this statement - "It has been decided that Griffin will continue as a member of the South African touring team but will not bowl any more in this country.” The tour committee had requested at the end of the first Test that an additional player be sent from South Africa. It was thought the tour committee asked for Transvaal fast bowler Peter Heine as a replacement but the request was refused, so Griffin was forced to continue the tour as a batsman only.

Pithey missed some matches with illness and McKinnon did not play after the Test at The Oval.

Fixtures/Results

† Arundel	Duke of Norfolk's XI	Won 5 w
Worcester	Worcestershire	Won 133 r
Derby	Derbyshire	Won inns 24
Oxford	Oxford University	Drawn
Ilford	Essex	Won 6 w
Cambridge	Cambridge University	Won 7 w
Lord's	M.C.C.	Drawn
Northampton	Northamptonshire	Lost 4 w
Trent Bridge	Nottinghamshire	Drawn
Stoke-on-Trent	Minor Counties	Won 9 w
Cardiff	Glamorgan	Won inns 133
EDGBASTON	ENGLAND First Test	LOST 100 r
Taunton	Somerset	Won inns 23
Southampton	Hampshire	Won 9 w
LORD'S	ENGLAND Second Test	LOST inns 73
Bristol	Gloucestershire	Lost 3 w
Old Trafford	Lancashire	Drawn
TRENT BRIDGE	ENGLAND Third Test	LOST 8 w
Leicester	Leicestershire	Drawn
Lord's	Middlesex	Drawn
OLD TRAFFORD	ENGLAND Fourth Test	DRAWN
The Oval	Surrey	Drawn
Swansea	Glamorgan	Won 9 w
Edgbaston	Warwickshire	Drawn
Sheffield	Yorkshire	Drawn
Hove	Sussex	Abandoned
Canterbury	Kent	Won 160 r
THE OVAL	ENGLAND Fifth Test	DRAWN
Portsmouth	Combined Services	Won 227 r
Hastings	A.E.R.Gilligan's XI	Won 113 r
Blackpool	Lancashire	Won 5 w
Scarborough	T.N.Pearce's XI	Won 4 w

† not first-class

Time spent in England before First Test:

53 days

(17 April - 9 June)

Test appearances on tour

5 - Adcock, Carlstein, Goddard, McGlew, McLean, O’Linn, Tayfield, Waite.

4 - Fellows-Smith

3 - Pothecary, Wesley

2 - Griffin, Pithey

1 - McKinnon

0 - Duckworth.

Highlights

• Neil Adcock took 5-62 in the first Test and 6-68 in the fifth. His 26 wickets in the series equalled Tayfield’s record set on the prvious tour in 1955

• Griffin took a hat-trick in the Lord's Test but was also no-balled elevn times in the innings, and was subsequently no-balled for throwing in the exhibition match that followed.

• In the fourth Test Roy Mclean scored 109, South Africa's only century of the Test series.

Tour Summary

	P	W	L	D	Aban
Test Matches	5	0	3	2	-
Other first-class matches	26	14	2	9	1
ϯ Minor matches	1	1	0	0	-
All Matches	32	15	5	11	1

Return to South Africa

C Wesley remained in Europe for a holiday. The team flew from Heathrow Airport to Johannesburg on 15 September 1960 in the same plane that took the New Zealand Olympic team from Rome.

Time away from South Africa 151 days

(17 April to 15 September)

Finances

This was the first South African tour since the second world war not to make a profit. The tour accounts showed that expenses of £35 000 were not covered, giving a loss of £4 000.

Published accounts of the tour

"Cricket On Trial" John Arlott

"Cricket Overthrown" Charles Fortune

"Perchance to Bowl" John Waite.