From the Vault: Arlott on Laker

Today's Guardian carries an archive obituary of Jim Laker by John Arlott 22 years after the former England spinner died. Arlott, who was cricket correspondent for the Guardian between 1968 and 1980, paid handsome tribute to Laker and carried some short anecdotes, such as the following:

He once asked me how many strides he took in his run-up to the wicket - "Sometimes four, sometimes five, sometimes six." "Well," he said, "you have missed four-and-a-half, five-and-a-half, and the little rock." He had so many arcs of flight - and none of them foreseeable by the batsman - that he took wickets through the air as well as off the pitch. Once that deadly off-spinner landed, though, it tugged at the earth and turned back savagely: or, just when the batsman thought himself used to that, it pitched and skidded and there was a catch to slip - and there was that twisted grin of satisfaction.