by The commission came by post, which was unusual even in 1994. We don’t pay very well, he said, but we can offer you a “sliver of immortality”. Only a Wisden editor could write that.
The editor was Matthew Engel, and he managed to (unknowingly) lure me into sports writing. Five years earlier, when I was considering an unexpected offer to move from arts and features editor to cricket writer for the Independent on Sunday, what he insisted on was an anthology of Matthew’s dazzling spell in the role. read the same at the Guardian. So, I jumped at the chance to work with him and spent long hours sweating over the Almanack media round. Only in Wisden could this appear on page 1,359.
Related: England’s Rob Key endorses the Kookaburra ball for full-time use in county cricket
In 1996 Matthew was looking for a new editor for Wisden Cricket Monthly. Even if I wasn’t a fan of his, Wisden would be hard to turn down. I had bought my first Almanack when I was 10, getting a full £2 (these days it’s £60). I was not a collector, but I felt the pull of Wisden’s history, which began in 1864, ten years before Test cricket itself.
The problem with the attraction was that it had a tendency to drag people back into the past. Even the Monthly, founded by cricket historian David Frith in 1979, had become dated. It needed a refresh – with more variety, bigger pictures and livelier writing. Frith, this was probably all froth, but we had to attract younger readers.
And younger writers. We started an intern scheme, which proved to be quite successful as there was nowhere else for aspiring cricket correspondents to go. The first intern was Tanya Aldred, now queen of the Guardian on the county stage. Among her successors were Rob Smyth, who is now the master of the extra report, and Lawrence Booth, who is now the editor of Wisden.
They all showed precocious talent, but Lawrence had something even rarer: a precocious mind. Whatever care you threw at it, it remained remarkably calm. When we set out to build the brand new Wisden website in 2001, he was the lead writer. He soon joined the Guardian, where he ran a newsletter called the Spin.
Our website was doomed: Cricinfo, the Wisden of the world wide web, was too far ahead. Wisden’s then owners, the Gettys, saw this and combined the two (if you can’t beat ’em, buy ’em), before selling Cricinfo to Disney. I was laid off, then immediately rehired because the Almanack needed an editor for 2003, until Matthew returned from the Guardian job in Washington. I couldn’t resist the chance to be the editor of the shortest Wisden.
Again, it was clear what was needed: some sympathetic reform. Although Wisden’s words had become more colourful, the outline remained vague. The cover was an annual cover, set in stone since 1938. He was clamoring for a photo of the leading player the year before, preferably one that shows some passion. I promised to keep the distinctive features – the yellow background, the Playbill logo, the stump dimensions – and only add a black and white portrait. The chairman, Sir Paul Getty, was pressed by one argument: wouldn’t the 1948 edition be more impressive with Compton and Edrich on the cover celebrating their achievement in 1947?
When we announced the change, the Guardian put it on the front page and Lawrence ran a follow-up feature. From elsewhere on Fleet Street came the sound of the harp. For Ian Wooldridge, the Daily Mail’s sports writer, putting a photograph on the cover of Wisden “was little less heretical than slapping a picture of Judas Iscariot on future editions of the Holy Bible”. The young Michael Vaughan seemed to have no say in that sport. Giles Smith, in the Telegraph, had a smarter line: “De Lisle has dragged Wisden, kicking and screaming, into the 1920s.”
An email came in from a participant, Simon Barnes. “I hope you’ve enjoyed your year,” he said, “as George Lazenby of Wisden.” I certainly had it, thanks to the quiet excellence of the permanent staff, although you feel the weight of the thing when it lands on your shoulder. The proofs of the page are terrifying, the pressure is pressing. You have to work out not what you think about cricket’s endless questions, but what Wisden thinks. The restlessness is the one responsible for writing the Notes.
The best thing is to be a former editor. Wisden publisher and principal partner Chris Lane invites us all to the launch dinner in the Long Room at Lord’s. Waiting everywhere, next to the wine glasses, is a bright yellow book. Every year I go through it, scoffing at the errors page (this time there’s a slip on a county scorecard that hadn’t been noticed in 98 years) and appreciating Lawrence’s discreet updates. Before his time only one woman had ever been among the top five cricketers of the year (Claire Taylor, chosen by Scyld Berry in 2009); Lawrence has nine more nominees, including the first female cover star, Anya Shrubsole, in 2018.
All editors leave a stamp. John Woodcock made Wisden wiser, Graeme Wright broadened his perspective, Engel gave it humor, Berry made it more about the players. Lawrence, the son of two therapists, has made him more diverse and empathetic. “I’ve tried to be guided,” he says, “by the idea that cricket’s place in the world is as interesting as cricket itself. Tanya Aldred’s annual piece on the impact of the climate crisis should feel as natural as saying goodbye to Stuart Broad.”
He now has a record of his own. Almanack 2024 is Lawrence’s 13th, making him Matthew’s longest-serving editor. He just needs to retire before going up against Norman Preston (1952-1980), whose final decade was not at his best.
At the grand old age of 161, Wisden should be an anachronism. Yet it is a perennial bestseller and a key reader, as it serves as the conscience of cricket. It’s in good hands with Lawrence, who has a moral compass to match her composure.
Uncle and nephew to the rescue
It’s not easy to get excited about the County Championship when an icy wind is blowing and every game in the round ends in a final. But one of those drew a delicious moment of the sort you’d expect in village cricket, not the professional game.
Joe Denly, doing his best to save the game for Kent against Essex at Chelmsford, Jaydn Denly, his nephew, came into the middle. Joe (aged 38) was playing his 239th first-class match, Jaydn (18) his first. Neither had made a mark in the match, although Jaydn’s opening innings, a 16-ball duck, suggested that it was a chip from the veteran batsman.
Gathering at 65 for a dangerous five, the Denlys went in as Denlys do. Joe mixed stubborn defense with a big shot at times, hitting two sixes and just one four in his 39 off 64 balls. When he was out, Jaydn dominated, finishing with an unbeaten 41 off 128 balls, with a four. Both wore black armbands in honor of the late Derek Underwood. A brave warrior as well as a superb bowler, Derek the Killer of the Denlys would have been praised.
Quote of the week
“It was heartening to think England had lost a Test match, drawn a series and won an argument” – Rory Dollard, in the new Wisden, on last year’s one-run win in Wellington.
Memory lane
Shane Warne and fellow Australian Michael Clarke are in the final for Hampshire a day before the start of the 2004 County Championship. Warne first played for the county four years earlier and this was the first and only summer Clarke in the counties. He struggled with runs but found some flow in July when he scored three consecutive Championship hundreds. A Test debut followed later in the year, with the future Australian captain hitting a famous 151 against India in Bengaluru.
Still want more?
Kookaburra ball has impressed Rob Key despite drawing nine games in the County Championship: “I think it’s been great. You see what four-day cricket is all about.” Ali Martin reports.
Another view: the lead draws in another magical week in county cricket, writes Gary Naylor.
Derek Underwood, England’s greatest bowler, has died aged 78. Ali Martin pays tribute, as does Vic Marks.
And Scott Boland chats with Ali Martin.
Contact the Spin…
…by writing to Tim de Lisle.
I?
To subscribe to The Spin, just visit this page and follow the instructions.
