Roy Tattersall - Early Career

Early Career

Tattersall, a late developer, began his first-class cricket career in 1948, at a time when English bowling was weak because World War II had decimated their pre-war pace attack. He first played for Lancashire in 1948 as a medium fast bowler, taking 66 Second XI wickets. He did not establish himself until 1950 after Roberts, Price and Nutter had left the staff and he changed to bowling mainly off-breaks, something he developed in Minor County cricket. That year, largely as a result of groundsmen at Old Trafford deciding to eliminate watering of the pitch, Tattersall consistently had pitches tailor-made for him and he did not disappoint, being the leading wicket-taker in first-class cricket with 193 victims for under 14 apiece. This won him the inaugural Cricket Writers' Club Young Cricketer of the Year award. Although he was not risked in the Tests against a powerful West Indian batting line-up, Tattersall was chosen as a reinforcement for the 1950–51 Ashes series that winter. He did modestly in Australia, but bowled well enough on the more helpful New Zealand pitches to establish himself in the Test team for fourteen consecutive matches.