/ 23 August 1996

A fast trip to Madras

Jon Swift

EVEN now, the name Dennis Lillee strikes a chord as being one of the world’s great quick bowlers. Perhaps the great West Indian Wes Hall is a bit further removed from memory than the angular Australian.

But Cedrick English is taking the thoughts of both these towering exponents of seam with him to Madras on the Indian sub-continent.

English, the recipient of the latest Energade scholarship to the fast bowling academy Lillee founded and runs in Madras, cites Hall as the man he has modelled himself and his style on.

A surprise this, for Hall’s career of intimidating the English ended some time before the 22-year-old Griqua player was born.

“Yes,” he said at the Plascon Academy this week, “I’ve only ever seen TV clips of Hall but his rhythm and action were perfect.”

English will spend a week under Lillee in India gaining , as he puts it, “skills and experience” before returning for the six-match series against the Australian Academy tourists which starts on August 28 in Durban.

Local academy director Clive Rice sees the experience as invaluable.

“After all,” says Rice “we play about half our tours in that part of the world, so the bowlers might as well get used to the conditions. The experience can only do our fast bowlers good.”

It has certainly worked for Gary Gilder, who preceded English to the Lillee school.

He rose from Natal B, to the South African 8s side in Hong Kong, to success with the South African A side on the tour to Britain just concluded.

We await the coming exploits of English.