Action Replay
We remember when Gloucs were the one-day kings!
There had been precious little cause for the popping of champagne corks in Bristol for over 20 years when the 1999 season began under typically foreboding West Country April skies.
A solitary Gillette Trophy triumph in 1973 coupled with further Lord’s success in the Benson and Hedges Cup four years later meant there was still plenty of room in the trophy cabinet at the Nevil Road ground.
The need for a bigger one would have featured fairly low down on the priority list as the Gloucestershire team reassembled for their annual pre-season photo-shoot without their Caribbean stalwart, Courtney Walsh, who had claimed 106 County Championship scalps the previous season.
“Should a team revolve around an overseas player or an overseas player around a team?” asked Colin Sexstone, the county’s chief executive, rhetorically on the eve of the campaign, his view reflecting that of coach John Bracewell who wanted his side to take greater responsibility for their performances rather than sitting back and simply throwing the ball to their West Indian star.
Ironically, Gloucestershire, even without Walsh, were expected to be a greater threat in the Championship than in one-day cricket, perhaps not surprising given their underwhelming form in the shorter formats in previous seasons.
“I don’t think anyone was too worried about us but we had worked incredibly hard that winter,” says Rob Cunliffe. “We were fit, I mean properly fit. A lot of us were getting to the gym at 6.30 in the morning on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday – John Bracewell really transformed us into proper athletes.
“A lot of the games we would have lost in the past. We won because we were a lot sharper.”
Bracewell would be a pivotal figure in transforming Gloucestershire from alsorans to front-runners in all short format cricket. Appointed the previous season, the New Zealander didn’t suffer fools gladly and left his side in no doubt that winning matches was a serious business.
“He was a tough man – he told you how it was,” says Cunliffe. “But he wouldn’t ask you to do anything that he wouldn’t do himself. If you went for a nine-mile run then he would do it too and be up there at the front from start to finish.”
In a truncated Benson and Hedges Super Cup – limited to the top eight finishers in the previous season’s County Championship – Gloucestershire saw off Surrey in Bristol, with Aussie import Ian Harvey claiming four scalps in a sevenwicket romp.
Just over two weeks later, Sussex were beaten – albeit more narrowly – as Bracewell’s side breezed through to their first major final since 1977 against Yorkshire.
“We had a Wimbledon Crazy Gang feeling about us,” says Martyn Ball. “Both sides were staying at the same hotel, the Marriott in London, and they brought their whole entourage with them, committee members you name it. We just turned up with our wives and did what we usually did the night before – we went out for a meal and a couple of pints.”
It did the trick. With Walsh watching on from the sidelines, Mark Alleyne, the Gloucestershire skipper, smashed a memorable hundred as Gloucestershire scored 291 for nine in their 50 overs. Their scoring rate of 5.8 runs an over was the best ever witnessed in a oneday county final and typified the approach of a side intent on tearing up English cricket’s rule book.
With Greg Blewett dismissed by Harvey early,Yorkshire were never in the game, eventually falling 124 runs short. It represented an astonishing achievement for Bracewell’s unfancied men and another triumph for the county’s unheralded bowling attack. They had an approach that flew in the face of what had gone before.
“We were always one of the most popular counties on the circuit – some good lads to have a beer with,” says Ball. “But, particularly when we were bowling, I think we developed a much harder edge – we definitely saw it as 11 v 2 when we were in the field.”
With the Super Cup in the bag, attention turned to the NatWest Trophy and the potential of doubling the county’s all-time trophy haul in a single month.
The familiar barrier of Yorkshire stood between them and another trip to Lord’s but, again, Harvey’s nerveless bowling eventually saw them through, taking 2-45 from ten typically skilful overs to back up the 98 made by the evergreen Kim Barnett, who belied his advancing years throughout that season following his move from Derbyshire.
“Kim was unorthodox but him and Tim Hancock would always get off us to a good start without really taking too many risks,” says Cunliff. “Our running between the wickets was key as well, we were constantly turning ones into twos.”
Bracewell may not have been prone to smiling readily, but Cunliff insists that the Gloucestershire dressing room was a fun place to be, with the players always hanging around for a post-match pint and then heading out for the odd curry. The camaraderie built up by those early morning gym sessions also helped as the season reached its finale with a Lord’s showdown with neighbours Somerset.
With 28,500 people packed into Lord’s, it was Gloucestershire who held their nerve, with the bowling of Harvey, Mike Smith, Alleyne, Mike Cawdron and Ball limiting Somerset to 180 in their fruitless chase of a total of 230 which owed much to Hancock’s breezy 74.
The brilliance of Jack Russell won him the man of the match award but this was a team effort in every sense. And this was just the start.
The county won the treble the following season, retaining both the NatWest Trophy and Benson and Hedges Cup and adding the National League to a silverware haul that had left that previously under-utilised trophy cabinet groaning under its new-found weight.
“It was a special time,” says Cunliffe. “I think all of us felt very privileged to have been a part of it.”
In the blink of an eye, Gloucestershire had transformed English one-day cricket, with their fearless approach and fitness putting them on a different plane to the 17 other counties.
It wouldn’t last. But for those fortunate to have witnessed it, it was fun while it did.
In the blink of an eye, Gloucestershire had transformed English one-day cricket, with their fearless approach