John Hickey Part 1 – Life and times with Anson

I had the pleasure of speaking with Anson legend John Hickey this week. John finished playing for Anson just as my time started. Whilst our careers did overlap slightly, I didn’t know too much about John’s playing style or highlights or about the people in and around the club from when he started in 1961 up to his retirement in 1996.

John mentioned that he wasn’t sure if he would remember so much. Once the conversation got started though and I asked him about certain players and events it seemed to come back to him. This was just as well as I had a lot I wanted to ask him. We were on the phone for nearly two hours and below is a summary of some of what we discussed.

How it all started

John was a keen cricketer from a young age and a reputed fast bowler who represented London and Essex schools. He was a lightning-fast bowler and talk about being able to pursue the sport professionally was soon dashed. An accident that damaged his leg left him focusing on other things, such as his career and the entertainment going on up at the Lyceum.

Returning to the evening institute at his old primary school to take up table tennis, a chance meeting with Fred England’s wife, who knew of John’s cricketing abilities, quickly led to an invite to play for Anson, where Fred was already established.

Although John didn’t take cricket too seriously until after he got married, in 1966, it was clear that he had found a great bunch of lads in a family friendly club, well organised by the chairman, Charlie Turner and skipper, Ron Stringer, based at Grange Farm, in Chigwell.

High standards

The standard of cricket when John played was very high. They had someone in the team who had played for Ceylon, and another player who had been in the Essex squad. Ron Bootle worked in a bus garage and was able to recruit several West Indian migrants who worked on the buses, including a player called Andy Clarke who had turned down an opportunity at Surrey.

Many of these players didn’t stay at the club for too long. They left to form teams such as Leyton Cavaliers and West Essex, who Anson would instead play against. A lot of these players were very good, but John still described it as being a lot of fun.

One situation that John did lament was the missed opportunity to play against Charlie Griffiths in a team that was touring the UK. One of the guys in Anson was related to Griffiths and received a letter asking for a fixture. When this request was turned down for some reason John was devastated.

They did play against some notable players down the years, including Graham Gooch and his dad at East Ham Corinthians. There was also a young leg spinner at Gants Hill by the name of Nasser Hussain.

Leyton Cavaliers clearly had a lot of talented players. On one occasion John was facing a former Gloucestershire and Essex fast bowler and plodding along when the team wasn’t doing so well. As Monky came to the crease John said to him, ‘watch this guy, John. He’s a bit lively’ to which Monky responded ‘I’m not afraid of fast bowling’. John said, ‘I’m not saying that you are, I’m just saying he’s a bit lively’. Monky was standing at the crease with his bat up raised. As the ball was delivered his bat didn’t even come down before his off stump disappeared. As he walked off, he turned to John Hickey and said, ‘I see what you mean’.

John the all rounder

John’s style though wasn’t really plodding along. Being a big hitter and having a go was what John was better known for. The 46 sixes recorded against his name in The History is probably short of quite a few more from the records that were lost in the early 70s.

He only really developed his batting when his main strength of bowling was affected by a shoulder injury when he was 28. He didn’t bowl for six years after this. When he did get back into bowling it wasn’t with the same blistering pace as before.

John still managed to take a lot of wickets. Towards the end of his career he developed a technique where he bowled with a spinners action and whilst pitching the ball up used the seam to create movement both ways to pass the bat and take the edge.

His career best figures of 7-11 came against East Ham Corinthians on 11 May 1969. He thinks he might have even got Gooch Jr. for zero but still described his performance as not being his best. John described the game as a disaster for Anson, who didn’t bat very well. To add salt to the wound he finished the game with a broken finger whilst batting.

John felt that he couldn’t bat to save his life when he first started, and this accounted for so many ducks. I can empathise with that. He taught himself to bat whilst he went along and is one of the few players to appear on the list of those who have a score of 90 runs or more and 6 wickets or more.

Smashing the glass scorebox

John did tell one story of when he played for Old Cooperians. They were a very cliquey team. The only chance he got was when their regular opening batsman didn’t turn up. John volunteered to replace him, even though he said he couldn’t bat. What he didn’t count on was who was opening the bowling for River Head CC. It was none other than Middlesex and England fast bowler Alan Moss.

He took number 1 in the batting line up. The first ball he faced he struck a tremendous blow. It was still on the up as it went straight into a new glass scorebox that had been fitted on to the pavilion roof. In his words, he slaughtered this scorebox. He got 27 and Old Cooperians were out for 71 and lost by 10 wickets.

When he got home, his grandmother explained how he ended up on the back page of the East London Advertiser all because of how he had taken out this scorebox off the bowling of Alan Moss.

He certainly had the ability to hit the ball hard. On one occasion over at Forest Road, Fairlop, he hit a flat six that barely got 10 foot off the ground and nearly took out Mark Halford’s mother as she rounded the corner of one of the buildings at the ground. Everyone just froze as they foresaw an awful calamity that thankfully didn’t play out.

A hundred at last

He saved the best of his batting against another one of our rivals, Mallards, with his highest score of 115 on 28 August 1988. John was stand in skipper that day as Malcolm Dennison was running late. He won the toss and with no Malcolm on site he decided to bat.

The tradition in those days was to give your wicket away once you get to 50 to let others have a bat. But John had been thinking about trying to score a hundred for some time. The team found themselves 13-3 with Mark Halford back in the hutch. The time for focus was needed. As he neared the milestone, he had to slow down to allow time for his wife to get there to see him achieve his feat. Alf had been on the phone telling her to get over quickly.

In the later part of his innings as he had done his calf in. Much to the consternation of the opposition skipper, John had a runner who was much faster than him. He got to 100 and decided to have a bit of a dash and give his wicket away to let someone else bat. He felt he could have scored 200 that day if he really wanted too.

The match had an exciting finish as well. By the end of the innings John could hardly move having done both calf muscles. He fielded at gully where he could remain static. Malcolm Dennison was bowling fast. John took one catch that hit him in the chest before taking the final catch of the innings right in front of his eyes from a ball that was so quick it would have killed him if he hadn’t caught it. With the scores level and all 10 Mallard wickets taken this extraordinary game ended in a tie.

John feels he might have scored more hundreds if he had been more focused. He just didn’t play the game that way. After he learnt to bat it wasn’t very often that he was got out by a bowler, but more that he played a bit cavalier (not reckless) to give others a game.

All day affairs

A lot of the cricket that Anson played during this period were all day games. These could be up to 60 overs an innings. The day I spoke with John was the hottest of the year so far and he remembered having to bowl 15 overs in similar heat. That was nothing compared to 29 overs he had bowled in one game. He missed out on one over only because he switched ends as he didn’t like bowling down the hill and he took a wicket whilst overstepping the line. He got the same batsman out shortly after with the same ball.

With the all-day games they used to take 40 minutes for lunch, 20 minutes for tea, and had 20 overs from 6:30. Games started at 11. John had to get a second car so that his wife and family could come over on their own to watch because he had to leave so early.

When John first started playing for Anson they used to play home matches at Grange Farm, in Chigwell. Sadly now it is a housing estate. Grange Farm was like a holiday centre. It had a lido and lots of facilities and camping. It wasn’t unusual for about 300-500 people to be drawn towards watching the game. The wickets were also of fantastic quality. Overall playing at Grange Farm helped in attracting a lot of good opposition. Unfortunately, Anson had to move elsewhere when Grange Farm closed as a cricket facility and became a paraplegic centre. Anson first moved to Rise Park in Romford and then eventually to Forest Road at Fairlop. John felt that the move to these lesser grounds did lead to lesser quality fixtures.

A missed opportunity for one of England’s greatest players

The social side was very important to the team. Going down the pub after every game was just as an important part of the day as the cricket itself. Others liked to socialise with them, including Alf, who played for one of the Co-op teams in the early years. Occasionally a young Jimmy Greaves would join them in the pub as well.

Jimmy was a big cricket fan and wanted to play. Unfortunately, his ill-fated transfer to AC Milan meant that he was never able to fulfil his ambition to play for Anson.

A final bow

John’s playing career ended in 1996. The game he knew had changed a bit. In one game, a bit of jibing from Monky led to a batsman walking down the pitch swinging the bat him. Both teams had to come off for a bit and this led John questioning whether he wanted to carry on. He played a few more games but his final match was at Tilbury that year. He got out early in the second innings. As he walked off he gave all his gear to George Netley and threw his boots in the bin. John didn’t realise then that he most likely had a cataract issue, and he couldn’t pick the ball out of the gloom. He was 53 at that time. He didn’t have any regrets. An indication that he gave it up at the right time. He obviously has a lot of fond memories though.

John is a true legend of Anson and only Alf has played across more seasons than John. There are about four and half years of records missing as well, so the 281 appearances on record could well be about 60 or so short, if not more. Goodness knows how many more runs you would need to add to the 3,773 he scored or the 174 wickets that he took.

Across his career, John has seen a lot of players, good and bad. The second part of this blog post will give a bit of insight into some of those players.