Six balls to go. Warwickshire need 10 to win. The sun is setting fast on St John’s Wood as the 1989 NatWest final reaches its climax at a sold-out Lord’s.
Among the travelling fans, stress levels rose as quickly as the lights disappeared behind the pavilion. A first trophy since 1968 was tantalisingly close, but 10 points from the over would not come easy.
Simon Hughes, a wily death bowler in a highly accomplished Middlesex team, held the ball in the middle of the September darkness.
Asif Din was trying hard to get Neil Smith, the promising but inexperienced all-rounder, to strike. The bespectacled 22-year-old was struggling to hit the ball with his Duncan Fearnley blade. Hughes was sliding in, and as he bowled, a forthright Warwickshire fan shouted a simple instruction from the packed stands: “Hit it!”
Smith hit him. Stepping back, releasing his arm, he hit the ball with the flat stick and connected perfectly with the slow-moving ball. The ball soared through the dark sky, high and straight over Hughes’ head, into a sea of suddenly delirious Bears fans. “WARWICKSHIRE, LA, LA, LA!”
“Footwork has never been out of the coaching book,” Jack Bannister commented in the commentary box. “The ball almost came off the ground.” Six, in an era when maximum achievement really does matter.
The next ball was a shot into Smith’s pads. Hughes squirted the fourth ball down leg. Umpire Dickie Bird thought for a moment before signalling wide. Two needed from three.
The fourth legal ball was thrown hard into the field by Smith, past the stumbling and helpless Hughes. The batsmen ran fast for two points. Warwickshire won.
“I had a system of mixing yorkers and slower balls and did it quite well,” Hughes said. “In the semi-final against Hampshire, I bowled the penultimate ball to Malcolm Marshall and got about four singles. It was a fairly innovative new way of bowling in the final over. Up until that final, it had never failed.”
Mike Gatting, the Middlesex captain, later said he would use his allowance to ensure Warwickshire did not suffer defeat. “Gatting wasn’t the only one who backed me to stay in 10th,” Hughes said. “Desmond Haynes was banking on the cast iron guarantee because he had spent his winning bonus. He bought some accessories for his car in Barbados, a spoiler and some alloy wheels. When I see him now he says: ‘Yozzer, you owe me five grand.’”
“For a young player, it’s a pretty stressful situation,” Smith said. “The cameras, the crowd.”
Regarding what BBC presenter Tony Lewis called his “ultimate struggle” in the highlights, he said: “Simon was one of the best bowlers with the slow ball. Now they all have variations, but in those days not many bowlers did. I bet that would happen. I’m a little too far from it, which is why it looks so bad.”
The scorecard backs up Smith’s recollection of a “miserable, low-scoring game… dull even for the time”. The pitch was not fast enough. Middlesex’s Norman Cowans bowled 12 overs for 23 runs (economy rate 1.91). Warwickshire’s chief innovator, Dermot Reeve, conceded 27 from his 12 deliveries.
“We were at Headingley a few days before, a quiet place in the Championship,” said Smith. “I came in as a nightwatchman on Thursday and got 160 on Friday. I’d never even got a first-class 50 before.”
Haynes top-scored, hitting a half-century before being bowled by Smith. That valuable wicket combined with the previous day’s personal best boosted the youngster’s confidence for the final match.
“Part of the day is to accept it,” Smith said. “If you let the pressure get the better of you, that’s when you’re not going to perform. Asif was at the other end and had a pretty cool head: ‘Do something and we’ll make a run.’
Smith had a mediocre season in the Championship. He harboured legitimate concerns about a new contract and his role in Warwickshire’s triumph, including a brilliant performance in the quarter-finals, saved his career.
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“They said: ‘We will let you go, but we are prepared to offer you another year.’ I said no to one year. They came back and offered me two years. That gave me the confidence to keep going.”
Collectively, the win also laid the foundation for an era of unrivalled success for Warwickshire. “The positive development of cricket that we played throughout the 90s started after that,” Smith said. “The margins were small. How do we win? How do we improve?
“That led to a mentality of breaking the game down and we became a progressive team. We analysed every moment and quickly coined the phrase: ‘Every ball is an event.’ Don’t let the ball go. In 1994, when Brian Lara came in, he went over the goal mark. That gave us so much time to win games.”
Next Monday marks 35 years since the momentous occasion at Lord’s that influenced the entire development of the sport. Though surely the memory has faded and Hughes is rarely reminded of it now?
“No. Oh my God, no,” he said. “My whole career is synonymous with that ball. You can’t change that. I’d rather my career be remembered for something good, but at least be remembered for something.
“[But] I was very fortunate. I played in four Middlesex teams that won the Championship and four or five teams that won the cup. It was a period of incredible success.”
Smith said: “I’m 57. I’m referred to as the guy who hit sixes at Lord’s or ‘The Kid…’ despite having nine or 10 winners’ medals from Warwickshire and being in the World Cup.”
Smith retired in 2004 and became a groundskeeper at Leamington CC, where he began his cricketing career. At 91, his father MJK, a former Warwickshire and England captain, is still involved.
“He sits on the rollers for me,” Smith said. “He can get on and off the rollers. He still has a sense of responsibility and feels like he’s contributing. Cricket is a part of his life.”
So it was with Neil Smith’s life. Although it would have been very different if not for Hughes’ slow ball and his sweet, nasty sixes.
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