David Frith - sketch by Maha
by Mayukh Ghosh
"My first words in print - outside the school magazine in Sydney (early 1950s) - were in the St George Call, the Sydney suburban newspaper where I lived. They were football reports, and "Dave E.Frith" actually played in the matches described."
"In the late 1960s I did rugby and football reports for Reg Hayter's agency.
Around that time I was running copy for several writers as I picked up my couple of guineas from the Hayter agency. I actually walked all the way from The Oval or Lord's to Fleet Street to hand in the hand-written story of the day."
1968.
David Frith started his research on Andrew Stoddart.
He wanted to make a book out of it, despite not even being a regular writer on the game.
One day, out of the blue, Reg Hayter asked Frith if he'd like to ghost John Edrich's book.
The advance was £200, a princely amount in those days.
And a very reasonable deadline.
Edrich lived nearby and Frith had no hesitation in taking up the project.
He bought some recording tapes and away they went.
"We sound at times not altogether dissimilar to Pete and Dud, but we got the job done on time"
Runs in the Family was published on July 21, 1969.
Years later, when I asked him about this, he said, " Yes, I have tender feelings about my first book and Neil Armstrong's coincidental effort. I really did wonder if I could take it as an omen."
Fifty years as a cricket writer.
Writing books.
Neville Cardus?
No.
Richie Benaud?
No.
David Foot?
No.
Henry Blofeld?
Yes but he didn't produce anything ‘new’ in the last ten years.
When I pointed this out to him, he admitted that he never thought of it before.
"Thanks to the delay in the Hurwood book ( diary of Alec Hurwood, edited by him), the 50-year timing has been perfect."
And then added: “Makes me feel like Methuselah”.
He's updating his book on Archie Jackson.
"The enlarged update of the Archie Jackson book is also due out in a few weeks' time, a deeply poignant work since I was inserting all the new material in between hospital visits to Debbie. My feeble beloved's last days and nights were in parallel with what I was writing about Archie and his courageous and loyal fiancee back in 1933."
2019 will be the first year since 1950 that he will not attend a cricket match. But he still finds hope in the game which has given him everything in life.
“If I have one more book left in me it might be Caught England, Bowled Australia (his autobiography), which needs updating and amending. We'll see…..”
One of a kind.
There will never be another David Frith.