Lethal Laker's cache of 19

The Old Trafford Test between England and Pakistan starting on Thursday will mark the 50th anniversary of one of the greatest of all individual cricketing deeds - Jim Laker's 19 wickets against Australia. Read Christopher Martin-Jenkins' description of the match in The Times.

As a sporting achievement it was a freak, the cricketing equivalent of Foinavon’s victory in the Grand National, Bob Beamon’s long jump record in the 1968 Olympic Games, or Tiger Woods’s first victory in the Masters, 12 strokes clear of all the others.