1968. After his 158 at The Oval Basil D’Oliveira was left out of the South African tour. There was unrestrained jubilation as the news reached South Africa. Prime Minister BJ Vorster was ecstatic.
Subsequently, when Tom Cartwright withdrew because of shoulder problems, D’Oliveira was included in the side. Vorster fumed that it was not a team representing MCC but the Anti-Apartheid Movement. They could not have a Coloured cricketer playing Whites in South Africa. The tour was cancelled.
The floundering of MCC, the shilly-shallying, and the various decidedly less than above board interactions with South Africa in this matter did not please everyone. A special meeting of the MCC was proposed by a rebellious group and was held on 5 December 1968.
Former England captain, the Bishop of Woolwich, Rev David Sheppard assumed leadership. He had been an anti-apartheid voice for a long time. Three motions were proposed at the meeting.
1. The members of the MCC would publicly regret their committee’s handling of the matter leading up to the selection of the team for the 1968–69 South Africa tour.
2. No further tours to and from South Africa were to be undertaken until evidence was obtained of actual progress by South Africa towards non-racial cricket.
3. A special committee needed to be set up to examine such proposals as were submitted by the South African Cricket Association towards non-racial cricket.
Of course, the conservative members of the MCC were shocked at the suggestions. But the motions were put to vote.
They were proposed by Sheppard. And they were seconded by a 26-year-old Mike Brearley.
Quite a step for a man just starting his cricketing career. The men who defended MCC against the proposals ranged from president Arthur Gilligan to treasurer Gubby Allen to the former Prime Minister Alec Douglas Home. But, Brearley did not flinch.
When the Stop The Seventy Tour movement arranged a national conference at Hampstead Town Hall on 7 Mar 1970, Brearley was one of the speakers during the morning session.
While he was not really in favour of direct-action tactics, Brearley was dead against the South African tour.
Later he became one of the most successful captains of England. As also the President of MCC. Some of the moves that he devised became stuff of legend. Be it placing a helmet at short mid-wicket and inviting the batsman to try and get five penalty runs, or placing all fielders including the wicketkeeper on the ropes, or asking a long-retired Fred Titmus, in the dressing room to visit old mates, to stay on and bowl for Middlesex at the age of 49.
Brearley himself admits that not all the moves he planned came off to perfection. He freely acknowledges the role of luck. When Ian Botham was going through a rough time as the captain of the England team in the Caribban, Brearley’s advice to him had been succinct and practical: “Find someone else to captain England.”
He knows he would not have managed the win-loss record of an amazing 18-4 had he not had been blessed with Ian Botham, Bob Willis and David Gower playing for him at the simultaneous summits of their careers. He might not have had that amount of success had he not played a Packer depleted Australia and some rather ordinary sides during his tenure. . When England toured Australia in 1979-80, the famous old hands had returned from their World Series interlude. Lillee, Cappell and the rest destroyed England 3-0. As Brearley maintained, captaincy could not perform miracles
He once received a letter from Ray Illingworth that congratulated him for being theluckiest man ever to lead England. And he agreed. Brearley himself writes that the most critical tactic on the field, as Australia chased a small total in the fourth innings, had been suggested not by him but by Mike Gatting.
Yet, Brearley had contributed. Early in his innings, Botham had started to go for his shots. After trying to force Lillee off his back-foot and missing, the all-rounder had glanced up at the players’ balcony. There had been a wide grin on Brearley’s face, conveying that he had his full support to give unbridled expression to his batting. Botham could have been out immediately after that. One of his mistimed hooks could have fallen into the grasp of a waiting fielder rather than in no man’s land. However, he had continued to play his strokes, unrestrained, and they had come off.
It is not for nothing that Rodney Hogg made his famous observation that Brearley had a degree in people.
And then there was the occasion against Surrey at Lord’s in 1977 when he declared the Middlesex first innings at zero for no loss to take advantage of the green pitch. The final scoreline : Surrey 49 and 87 lost to Middlesex 0-0 declared and 137 for one.
Yes, Mike Gatting, Wayne Daniel, Vintcent van der Bijl, Clive Radley, John Emburey, Phil Edmonds, Mike Selvey, Roland Butcher … Middlesex was also a team sparkling with potential. However, Brearley ensured that all that talent was hitched together towards success.
Brearley will perhaps remain the only person to have been president of Marylebone Cricket Club as well as the British Psychoanalytic Council.
But, perhaps his most noble deed remains standing up to the august, conservative institution of which he later became the president — doing so in the early days of his cricket career, because he believed in a cause.
Mike Brearley was born on April 28, 1942