by Arunabha Sengupta
1968.
Tom Cartwright was in prime form, with 68 Championship wickets at 15.17 apiece. Six fifers, two ten-fors.
However, he had played just 16 of Warwickshire’s 28 matches that season, having missed nine of the last 10 matches of the county. He had trouble both with his shoulder and his knee.
The selection of Cartwright as the all-rounder in the England side to South Africa during the winter was a bit surprising given his fitness problems. Over the last few years, his batting had also deteriorated.
Cartwright himself was not having an easy time with the developments. “[A woman calling from BBC] asked me very aggressively how I felt. ‘Aren’t you sorry [that Basil D’Oliveira was not chosen]?’ I remember saying, ‘I’m sorry for a lot of people. I’m sorry for Alan Jones of Glamorgan. He’s had such a brilliant season, and he’s very unlucky not to be picked’.”
But then he had read in the paper that the MPs in the South African parliament all cheered when they heard D’Oliveira had not been picked. It did make him uneasy.
He was receiving cortisone injections on his shoulder in order to be fit for the Gillette Cup final on 7 September. His 3 for 26 had been instrumental in beating Middlesex at Lord’s in the semi-final three weeks earlier.
He spent the night in Clarendon Court Hotel on the night before the final against Sussex, and hardly slept a wink. The following morning, he reached the dressing room, turned his arm over and found it impossible. He did not even go to the nets.
England selector Donald Carr approached him. “You’re our property now.” He wanted Cartwright to see Bill Tucker, an orthopaedic surgeon with consulting rooms in Park Street, off Park Lane. He had taken care of Denis Compton’s knee.
Tucker’s report to Carr did not look promising. There was a chance of his never being able to bowl again if he did go to South Africa.
On 16 September, Cartwright received a call from Colin Cowdrey. Could he confirm his availability? If something went wrong during the tour, Don Wilson or someone else coaching in South Africa could be brought in, assured the England captain. Till then, there was no suggestion of any D’Oliveira factor.
Cartwright said no. Cowdrey accepted the decision.
Cartwright’s biographer Stephen Chalke says: “Tom withdrew for three reasons: his injury, the effect on his family of being away all winter and his unease at the reaction of the South African parliament when Basil D’Oliveira was not selected. The three factors did combine in his mind to make him think, ‘I just don’t want to go.’”
Not a black and white decision. But nothing in life is black and white. Ironically, that is true even when we talk of the apartheid.
Tom Cartwright refused to go. Basil D’Oliveira, curiously left out the first time, had to be selected. Yes, had to be. There was so much criticism after his omission, the selectors would not have been able to deal with a second round.
And BJ Vorster erupted. A cape-coloured cricketer could not play against the whites in South Africa.
The rest, as they say, is history.
Cartwright was a very very good bowler. And a fairly decent batsman. As a 17-year-old, he was making headlines with his classical batting. By the time he was in his late twenties, he was a tormenting medium pacer. The only post-war cricketer alongside Richard Hadlee to have scored a double hundred in first-class cricket and taken 15 wickets in a match.
Later he coached for a long, long time, guiding a raw Ian Botham to bowling success at Taunton, moving up and down the hills and valleys of Wales passing his craft on to young cricketers.
And he was a man of integrity. Mike Brearley said he reminded him of Caleb Garth of Middlemarch without the high moral ground. When he fell out with Warwickshire in 1969, and signed for Somerset, the former county tried to prevent him from playing in 1970. He won a ground-breaking hearing at Lord’s. And then along with Brian Close and a few others he changed the fortunes of Somerset.
However, he is far more important in history because of that decision not to go to South Africa.
Tom Cartwright was born on 22 July 1935.