Colin Cowdrey
Cowdrey won a Heath Harrison Exhibition award and a place at Brasenose College at Oxford University to study geography in the autumn of 1951. He played for the Oxford University Cricket Club in 1952 and 1953 at the start of the season and the rest of the summer for Kent. He made 50 and 57 for the Gentlemen vs the 1953 Australians at Lords. In 1954 he captained Oxford University and was a surprise choice for the MCC tour of Australia, replacing Willie Watson. Len Hutton later told him that his selection was a gamble, but it was thought that his technique would be good on the hard Australian wickets. At 21, Cowdrey was the youngest man in the side and the schoolboy photographs used in the brochures made him appear younger. He had yet to make a century in the County Championship, go on tour or play a Test, though he was made twelfth man for the Fourth Test against Pakistan and fielded for 20 minutes, but was so nervous he could barely watch.
Colin Cowdrey
In 1950, the spinners Sonny Ramadhin and Alf Valentine had confounded the England batsmen to give the West Indies a 3–1 series win. Ramadhin still exerted his hold, taking 7/49 to dismiss England for 186 in the first innings of the First Test at Edgbaston. The West Indies made 474 and Cowdrey joined Peter May at 113/3 in the second innings, still 175 runs behind. May wrote of Cowdrey's "steadying influence on me when I was charging down the wicket and trying to hit everyone into the car park. I recall he calmed me down and said occupation of the crease was the vital requirement!" Cowdrey ruthlessly padded away any ball from Ramadhin outside off stump, where he could not be given out leg before wicket. "It was typical of Cowdrey that he should work out the theory so punctiliously", but his tactic became popular with less talented batsmen to the complaints of purists and detriment of the game. May made 285 not out and Cowdrey 154, his first Test century in England, and together they added 411 runs in 511 minutes, the third highest stand in Test cricket at the time, the highest for the fourth wicket until 2009, the highest stand ever made for England and the highest stand against the West Indies by any team.