by Mayukh Ghosh
"Don't worry, my young champion, we're going to get 'em ( no he too didn't say 'in singles'), just leave it to your Derbyshire gaffer."
A minute later he was being carried back to the pavilion on shoulders.
Gladwin and Jackson.
The most feared fast bowling pair in county cricket.
Great friends as well. But their approaches and views on life were different.
Jackson was often philosophical if a catch was dropped off his bowling.
Gladwin, on the other hand, exploded when that happened.
"I could have caught that bugger in the cheeks of my arse and wrapped a pink ribbon round it."
He could be a handful, with the ball in his hand and whenever he opened the mouth while talking to opposition batsmen.
Once Charlie Palmer was beaten time and again by him.
"Haven't you got a f****ing bat? Just leave your f****ing bat there and I'll f****ing well hit it."
At the end of the over Palmer walked down to tap down the pitch with his bat and said, "Well bowled, Cliff- and well f****ed!"
But he was a Derbyshire legend, for more reasons than one. Once, in Cardiff, he bowled unchanged for five hours ( with the usual breaks in between) to dismiss Glamorgan five short of their target.
8/114. Off 43.4 overs. He was 37.
He came back to the dressing room and shouted at one of his teammates, "And it would have been 113 if you hadn't misfielded that one in the third over."
He was a very skillful bowler. A fast bowler who was shrewd.
Not many used the crease like he did. And those inswingers coming in from different angles were unplayable at times.
Durban.
December 20, 1948.
The Derbyshire gaffer.
England needs 128 to win the match. In 135 minutes.
A rain delay of 10 minutes.
And then, in pursuit of quick runs, they slip to 70 for 6.
Compton and Jenkins add 45 but they both depart with 12 more to get.
As Gladwin reaches the crease, Dudley Nourse enquires, "What are you looking so cheerful about?"
"Well, cometh the hour, cometh the man.", replies the coal miner from Derbyshire.
One eight-ball over. Eight to get.
Lance Tuckett stands at the end of his run up.
"Just bowl straight and let them get themselves out.", murmurs Nourse.
Bedser and Gladwin.
The bright prospect from the much fancied Surrey team.
The foul mouthed, hardworking coal miner from the unfancied Derbyshire team.
A misjudgment from Eric Rowan at the deep midwicket boundary gives Gladwin and England four.
Then Bedser misses two balls.
It comes down to one off the final ball.
"Don't worry, my young champion."
Dead straight on middle and leg. Gladwin swings, misses, the ball whacks him painfully inside the right thigh.
"Run!", shouts Bedser.
Stumps are broken but Bedser makes it by a whisker.
After that tour Gladwin played only one Test match for England.
Years later when he was asked about what he was thinking when he went for that famous run, he said, "That the boys back home in the pit were never going to believe that it was 'the gaffer's' leg-bye that did it!"
Frank Keating later called it 'the leg-bye of the century'.