Alec Bedser - After Retirement

After Retirement

After retiring from playing cricket in 1960, Bedser served as a national team selector for twenty-three years and was chairman of selectors from 1969 to 1981. He was on the board of selectors who controversially left Basil d'Oliveira out of the England team for 1968's tour of South Africa. England won ten of the 18 series while Bedser was chairman of selectors. Bedser also managed two England overseas tours. Bedser was made president of Surrey in 1987 - recognition of his outstanding contribution to the county's cricketing fortunes over the previous five decades. He was knighted for his services to cricket in 1996. In October 2004 Bedser was selected in 'England's Greatest Post-War XI' by The Wisden Cricketer, an authoritative monthly cricket magazine. In May 2009, Christopher Martin-Jenkins ranked Bedser 29th in picking his 100 greatest cricketers of all time.

Neither Alec nor his brother ever married. They lived together in Woking until Eric's death in 2006. Sir Alec Bedser died in hospital in Woking on 4 April 2010 after a short illness. Among those to pay tribute to the more famous of the two brothers was former Prime Minister and well-known cricket lover John Major, who said: "Alec Bedser was one of the greatest medium-fast bowlers of all time. He was also one of the great thinkers about cricket and his wisdom was one of the great untapped resources of the modern game." For three months following the death of Arthur McIntyre on 26 December 2009, Bedser was the oldest surviving England Test cricketer. On Bedser's death, that distinction passed to Reg Simpson.

Outside of cricket, Bedser was a founding member of the right-wing pressure group The Freedom Association during the 1970s.