Coming in at No 50 in The Times newspaper's list of '50 greatest sports books', Hit hard and enjoy it, by the late T C 'Dickie' Dodds, first published in 1976, is reviewed in The Times sports pages, 6 December.
The review quotes The Guardian from its obituary of Dodds as an 'inspirational cricketer who batted for God and Essex', referring to the English county where he batted in 380 first-class matches between 1946 and 1959, scoring a total of 19,407 runs. That tribute, comments The Times review, 'is surely all that anyone should aspire to'.
The review continues: 'Dodds batted in the 1940s and 1950s with the joie de vivre of both the Edwardian biffer and the Pakistani maestro.... it was the way that Dodds approached the game that sings through in his autobiography. The son of a clergyman, Dodds said that his batting philosophy, which forms the the title of his book, was inspired by a "clear instruction in my prayers". Two weeks after having the Holy Spirit breathed into his game, he shared an opening stand of 270 with Sonny Avery against Middlesex.' [For those who don't know cricket that is a high score indeed.]
The review concludes by quoting his Essex team-mate as saying that 'his appearance is sufficiently dignified to qualify him for a bishopric or the Cabinet [while] his batting is fit for a World XI or the madhouse.'
English