State of pitch a central theme of 1957 test

SHAUN Pollock and his fellow commentators made frequent reference to the indentations in the St George’s pitch during the match there against Sri Lanka, and it took my mind back to the test against England at the same venue in March 1957.

I had just started work as a cub reporter at the EP Herald, where the editor -- and my first boss – was Shaun’s grandfather, “Mac” Pollock. To my surprise, he came into the reporters’ room on the first day of the test and told me to cover all five days of the test, not as a sports reporter, but to record activities in the crowd.

Of course, he had a twinkle in his eye, as he knew I had played cricket with his son, Peter (Shaun’s father) at school, and that I would infinitely prefer watching the test to reporting on cases at the local law courts, which was the normal cub reporter’s beat!

Well, coming back to the indentations, a decision had been made to re-lay the St George’s pitch with soil brought down from Durban. It had been given three months to bed in, but that did not prove to be enough.

It soon started to crack up and batting became a nightmare. Neither side scored more than 200 runs in an innings and by the end, the pitch had deteriorated into a mosaic of loose cracks the size of dinner plates, with some balls rearing alarmingly while others shot through ankle high.

Frank Tyson was almost unplayable, but so was Hugh Tayfield, and South Africa somehow managed to win the match by a few runs and square the series.

As for fulfilling the editor’s mandate, I managed to provide a story when the match was over – of thousands of spectators pouring on to the field and picking up pieces of the pitch and taking them home as souvenirs!

Mike Selley, Melkbosstrand