Wisden Cricketers' Almanack 1991 - Tapa dura

In years to come, cricket historians will turn to the 1991 "Wisden" as a record of a remarkable summer of run-scoring, during which it seemed that the sun always shone and batsmen were always making hundreds. There were a record 428 of them in the first-class game, and 32 of them were double-hundreds. Other records abounded. Some critics blamed the shift of balance from ball to bat on the radical changes brought in by the game's administrators in 1990. Jack Bannister disagrees, and argues strongly in "Wisden" that the changes will eventually benefit English cricket. Lancashire became the first county to win both Lord's finals in the same year. Michael Kennedy, who writes on cricket and music for "The Daily Telegraph", has followed Lancashire through generations of its cricketers, and writes with affection of them and their successes, yet can also ask: "Lancashire's revival - is it enough?". If one man stood out in 1990, it was the England captain, Graham Gooch. Simon Barnes, award-winning sportswriter on "The Times", offers a study of Gooch, man and cricketer. Don Mosey expresses his appreciation of Richard Hadlee, knighted in the year of his retirement, and a former editor of "Wisden", John Woodcock, pays tribute to Sir Leonard Hutton, who died in 1990.