The sad demise of Slazenger

It was the bat of the stylist, from Sobers to Dexter, Richards to Lamb, Bell to Mark Waugh… but now it’s the bargain blade from Sports Direct, and that upsets HUW TURBERVILL

Like jobs, or so the advice goes, it is good to chop and change your bat brands at the start of your career.

Of course they say the actual wood is the same, originating mainly from Kashmir or the Home Counties (Great Leighs in Essex is a hot spot, I am reliably informed)… it is just the stickers that vary.

I tried all the major brands before hitting adulthood. And I finally settled on Slazenger.

Like the classic cars, the striking panther was always a hallmark of quality for me.

They seemed unbeatably cool and stylish: the blade of choice; the weapon of heroes.

Majestic, swaggering, brutal Vivian Richards, his V500 – after he switched from Stuart Surridge and Duncan Fearnley – still filleting England as he peeled off crucial half-centuries against them in the 1991 Test series.

And Allan Lamb, the pint-sized defier, who in 1984 bravely counter-punched centuries off the West Indies’ fab four quicks with the classic V12 while other batsmen crumbled in their wake; he was like another diminutive-yet-powerful hero of mine at the time: Asterix, taking on his Roman oppressors.

Those Slazenger bats left an indelible impression on me as a youngster: clean, tanned wood, with a bold red V down the back. V for victory. V for resistance (have you watched the American sci-fi show of that name from that same year?). And V for Vendetta (see the comic book/film).

This most elegant of batons was then picked up by those most elegant of batsmen: Mark Waugh, who reminisced about them on Twitter recently, his old Slazengers lined up in his garage like the Terracotta Army of Xi’an. Who can forget the way he used it to such devastating effect for his 138 on Test debut against England at Adelaide in 1990/91?

^{Imran Khan at the crease with a Slazenger bat}

And Ian Bell, who announced himself to Test cricket with a crisp and neat, immensely pleasing debut innings of 70 against West Indies at The Oval in 2004, a knock I am so grateful to have witnessed in the flesh.

What I did not know when falling in love with cricket in the 1980s was that Slazenger had also been the bat of choice for Imran Khan, Rohan Kanhai, Frank Worrell and Garry Sobers, stylists supreme. But it certainly wouldn’t have done any harm in helping me make my selection!

Sir Geoffrey also used them. And while he rarely gave the ball a thrashing (save for the odd occasion like the 1965 Gillette Cup final when he thumped 146 against Surrey in 1965), the time he gobbled up at the crease is certainly testimony to the bats’ quality and endurance. In those days the stickers were green and white and they still looked lovely.

In researching this little love letter to my youth by trawling through the Getty Library, I also found pictures of Len Hutton, Don Bradman and Denis Compton Slazenger ‘Autograph’ bats.

Throw Neil Fairbrother, Mark Ramprakash and Carl Hooper into the mix and surely you must be convinced. They were the bats for cool cats all right. But actually hold on a minute… even that most stylish of sporting superstars, Severiano Ballesteros, used them.

There he is, in Surrey CCC whites, posing with a Slazenger bat near the pavilion at The Oval. He also used their balls, of course.

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And then there is Sean Connery as James Bond in Goldfinger, wearing a burgundy Slazenger sweater (his personal choice) – how awesome can you get?

Glamorgan and England opener Steve James used Slazenger and retains a fondness for the brand.

“When I played against Sri Lanka at The Oval nearly the entire England team were using them: Stewie, Ramps, Hick, Crawley, Butch, me, Ben Hollioake,” he told me.

“Eric Loxton was the bat maker of Slazenger. If you had an E on the shoulder of your bat it was always a gun because it was made by him. He retired in about 2002, and now the bats are clearly machine-cut.”

“Yes Eric did make a lot of my bats,” said Waugh. “I remember visiting the Slazenger factory in Barnsley and I was like a kid in a lolly shop.”

James also remembers it being a popular brand at his father’s sports shop, Peter James Sports, in Lydney, Gloucestershire, which he had owned for 25 years.

It must have helped that the bats I had were light and had a decent middle, of course. No one stays loyal to a plank.

Until recently I used a V1200, which had a lovely pick up and sweet spot, and I was also thrilled to buy an old-school V12 in a charity shop for a tenner a year or two back. I only batted with it once as it was a Harrow (one size down from adult), but in my opinion I have never looked better.

^{Ian Bell began life as a Slazenger man}

So what happened?

Well… I do not want to turn this into a personal rant, but Mike Ashley happened. Yes he bought Slazenger for Sports Direct in 2004.

This is certainly not the time nor the place to discuss his stewardship of Newcastle United; nor the merits of zero hour contracts; but the fact that Slazenger has become the economy-class cricket manufacturer fills me with a degree of sadness.

Of course Slazenger still has a role to play. I am trying not to sound like a snob. Many players want to play only occasionally, but not spend a fortune. Not everybody can be Kevin Keen when it becomes to our beloved summer sport. If an affordable bat gets a youngster playing, that is a good thing.

But in becoming the budget bat Slazengers are rarely used by the pros (James Anderson, Steve Finn and Jason Roy have all departed in recent years) and that is a shame. The Slazenger V600 (£374.99) and V500 (£499.99) still look nice, as does the classic, untampered-with V12 (£115), but it is not quite the same as seeing the greats use them in those golden decades.

Before cricket the company was already a legend in tennis since its founding in 1881 by brothers Ralph and Albert Slazenger, from a German-Jewish family living in Manchester. It has provided balls for Wimbledon since 1902.

They opened a shop in London's Cannon Street, and had particular expertise with Indian rubber which saw them pressed into emergency action in the War: making machine gun butts, bayonet grips, driving and boxing gloves and machete sheaths for the Allies. Slazenger and cricket became commercial bed fellows in 1930. It was sold to Dunlop Rubber in 1959, then Sports Direct for £40m.

Who knows, maybe Ashley will sell up, like he – at long last – appears to be doing with the Toon Army.

Maybe once again the flashing blade of Australia or England’s finest batsman with a V on its back will glint in the sunshine as it finds the boundary at Lord’s.

Let us hope this once-glorious brand’s elite reputation is salvageable.

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