Les Jackson and Cliff Gladwin: Masters of their Craft

by John Shawcroft

Fast bowlers are usually most lethal when they operate in pairs. In county cricket, Derbyshire’s Les Jackson and Cliff Gladwin formed the most dangerous new ball attack in the County Championship throughout most of the 1950s.

Neither were of express pace. Jackson was on the sharp side of fast-medium with a wicked break back, while Gladwin was an advocate of relentless, highly accurate medium paced in-swing delivered to a leg-trap, but they remain on the highest pantheon of Derbyshire’s impressive line of fast and fast-medium bowlers. Products of mining villages, with physiques developed by years at the coalface, they earned the respect of their peers.

England’s Test selectors took more convincing in Jackson’s case. That he appeared in only two Tests, in 1949 and 1961, is nothing short of a scandal, even in in an era of fast bowling riches in English cricket. His action, while legally without fault, veered on slingy and was not of the textbook, which failed to impress the mandarins at Lord’s. Derbyshire folk, and some players (Fred Trueman was especially outspoken) put it down to snobbery and Les’s mining background. Gladwin played in eight Tests and toured South Africa but was just below the high standards demanded at that level, where he operated in Alec Bedser’s shadow.

The author John Shawcroft has the advantage of having seen both bowlers throughout most of their careers. He has also spoken to many of their colleagues down the years and his own memories help flavour a fascinating story.