Sir Garry hits out, amid much gnashing of teeth by Glamorgan

Aug 30 2008 by Andrew Baldwin, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

PITY bowler Malcolm Nash. It was on August 31, 1968, that he was on the receiving end of a cricket record which will be unbeaten forever.

Nash became the unfortunate victim when Garry Sobers hit him for six sixes in one over in a County championship match at Swansea.

It was the first time the feat had ever been achieved in first-class cricket, although it has been repeated.

Sobers was captain of Nottinghamshire when he made his amazing knock in the match against Glamorgan.

He hit five clean sixes and one parried over the rope by fielder Roger Davis.

The 36 runs off an over beat the 57-year-old record of 34 runs, held by Ted Alletson.

The 1968 county season was in its last days when Sobers strode out for Nottinghamshire.

“Somehow one sensed that something extraordinary was going to happen,” said Wisden’s man

Sure enough it did. Sobers thrashed his way to immortality by taking a six off each ball of a Nash over.

Sir Garfield St Aubrun Sobers, to give him the official name he bears today, was born on July 28, 1936 in Bridgetown, Barbados.

He is widely regarded as the greatest all-rounder that cricket has ever seen.

He was a talented left-handed batsman with a superb career Test batting average of 57.78, one of the highest reached by any player. He scored 8,032 runs in his career, which was a record at the time.

Sobers was also a versatile bowler, taking 235 Test wickets at an average of 34.03. He bowled left-arm spin and also left-arm fast-medium.

Years after his 1968 feat he half-jokingly complained: “One of the things about the six sixes is that wherever I go to any part of the world everybody mentions the six sixes.

“I keep saying that it seems as though it’s the only thing I’ve ever done in cricket.”

On the day he hit six sixes in one over Nottinghamshire had won the toss and decided to bat in the match at Swansea.

Sobers hit 76 not out in that first innings when he made his record, helping his side to 394-5 declared.

He got 72 before being bowled in his second innings and Nottinghamshire won by 166 runs.

Nash took his thrashing quite well.

“We’ve gone into the record books,” he told Sobers. “And you couldn’t have done it without me.”

He explained later that he had been experimenting with his bowling on that fateful day.

“The captain asked me if I fancied having a go at bowling some slow-left armers. Sobers came along and quickly ended my slow-bowling career. It was a pretty short experiment,” said Nash.

He later went off to coach cricket in California after his retirement from playing in 1985.

And who went there to help him?

None other than Sobers, who went at Nash’s invitation to the first under-13 international between the US and Canada.

“Since our retirements we’ve played a lot of golf together,’’ says Nash. “We probably meet up about annually. We get on very well.”

Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips were to separate, Buckingham Palace confirmed on August 31, 1989.

It was her love of equestrian sport that brought her together with husband-to-be Mark Phillips of the Queen’s Dragoon Guards.

He was a three-day eventer and often competed against the princess. Their engagement was announced on May 29, 1973.

They married on November 14 at Westminster Abbey. She was 23 and he was 25.

In November, 1977, the couple moved to 18th-century Gattcombe Park, near Stroud, Gloucestershire, a £500,000 present from the Queen.

That month their first child, Peter, the Queen’s first grandchild, was born. In May, 1981, the Princess gave birth to daughter Zara.

In April, 1989, Buckingham Palace named Commander Timothy Laurence, equerry to the Queen, as the writer of a number of letters stolen from the princess’s briefcase.

Four months later the Palace announced that Anne and Mark were to separate and she later married Laurence.