Cricketers’ Who’s Who enters 43rd season of telling us what’s what

Late March’s balmy sunshine turned to sleet and snow last week, a sure sign that the English county cricket season is about to start. Another is the thunk of The Cricketers’ Who’s Whohitting the doormat.The annual tome of player profiles, stats and anecdotes pored over by fans and players alike is now on its 43rd edition.

The book provides a “unique insight” into the minds of those who will grace the grounds up and down the country for the next six months, from St Lawrence to Sedbergh, Edgbaston to Aigburth.

More than 400 (nearly but not quite all) players who make up the 18-county system, as well as all the contracted women’s players, have answered questions ranging from the thorny (“Which bowler would you least like to face?”Answer: invariably Darren Stevens) to the deep (“What gives you joy?”) and the downright disconcerting (“What’s the strangest object to be found in your house?”).

The foreword this year comes from Tim Murtagh (his guilty pleasure? bubble baths), about to embark on his 23rd season around the county traps.

“When I first went into a professional dressing room there was always a Cricketers’ Who’s Who in someone’s locker,” writes Murtagh. “There’s a lot of time to talk during matches, and we’d often play ‘guess the cricketer’: “This guy’s 40 years old, he averages 24 with the ball, his highest score is 74 not out and his lookalike is Frank Lampard. Who is he?” Or we’d open it just to see who’s had the dodgiest haircut or to read out some of the amusing comments.”

Murtagh joins an esteemed rollcall of names who have written an introduction to the book. His fellow stalwart Stevens confessed to owning every copy of CWW since he turned professional in 1997, likewise Marcus Trescothick mentioned in the 2017