Sunday 26 April 2009

Weapon of choice

Forget about Michael Vaughan's useless 'artballing', here's a genuine investment opportunity in the artistry of cricket: the good doctor WG Grace's bat.

Hard as nails, the colour of a conker and approximately as light and flexible as its owner, it's the bat with which Grace scored his 1,000th Test run, in 1896 at Lord's, the season he was a Wisden Cricketer of the Year.

You could follow the history of cricket just by charting the development of the bat, its form and its language, from WG's 'fully corded grip' to this and its ilk. 

Grace's bat has some powerful vibes in its grain. He gave it to Syd Gregory, who played against him at Lord's. Gregory gave it to his brother-in-law Harry Donnan. Harry was one of Bradman's early mentors at the St George cricket club, and he passed the bat to the club president. The bat is back in England for the first time in 113 years.

Yours for £25-30,ooo. Sold. Now let's see Chris Gayle open the batting with that...


2 comments:

12th Man said...

On a completely unrelated note, here is an article from your favourite writer Haigh.

Brit said...

Thirty grand seems quite underpriced.