Alec Bedser - Early Life and Career

Early Life and Career

Bedser was born a few minutes after his identical twin brother Eric (1918–2006) in Reading, Berkshire, where his father was stationed with the Royal Air Force. Within six months the family moved to Horsell, Surrey, where, at the age of seven, the brothers played their first organised cricket. Over the next decade they played together for Monument Hill School and Woking Cricket Club. After joining a local firm of solicitors, the twins were spotted practising in the nets for Woking Cricket Club by Surrey coach Alan Peach, and he recruited them to the staff at The Oval in 1938. A year later they made their first-class débuts for the county. Their careers were interrupted in 1939, when they joined the RAF to serve in World War II: they saw action at Dunkirk and later served in North Africa, Italy and Austria, both narrowly escaping from being shot in France. They were demobilised in 1946.

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