By Neil Fissler
Tony Cottey wrote himself into Glamorgan history when he hooked Kent’s Duncan Spencer to fine leg to hand the county their first one-day trophy.
Glamorgan had been without a trophy of any description since they won the County Championship in 1969 – but that was all about to change.
The Welsh side would become County Champions four years later but Cottey feels that it
doesn’t do justice to the talent they had in their side at the time.
He believes that the foundations for the AXA Equity & Law League were laid a season before when they went unbeaten for the last 14 games.
“We hadn’t won anything for nearly 25 years, the last trophy we had won was the Championship in 1969 so it was a massive year for the club,” he said.
“It was Viv Richards’ third and last year of competitive cricket but we had built on 1992 when we went the last 14 games unbeaten and were really in form.
“Viv had been away with the West Indies in 1992 so when he came back we were ready to challenge and he was the catalyst. He taught us how to win.”
Glamorgan started the AXA League in 1993 with losses to Derbyshire and Northants while their third game against Somerset at Taunton was rained off.
They then won their next 13 games but their penultimate game of the season against Essex at Cardiff was also called off meaning they went to table-toppers Kent for a winner-take-all shoot-out.
Glamorgan’s previous best finish was fifth in 1988 but they needed 201 to beat Kent who had scored 200-9 from their 50 overs.
They appeared to be a long way from victory at 141-4 when Cottey (33no) joined Richards (44no) in the middle for the partnership that would take them to victory.
Cottey says: “We went to Canterbury confident we could beat anybody. Back in those days you had a Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Monday Championship game.
“And we had this ‘cup final’ type game sandwiched in-between. Kent hammered us in the Championship but we believed if we played as we had been doing we would win it.
“The secret of our season was our running between the wickets and our fielding. We were the best fielding side, while people struggled to get Steve Barwick away.
“We also had Roland Lefebvre who could bowl yorkers for fun and Steve Watkin and Robert Croft, backed up by fantastic fielding.
“So we never had to chase too many which was a big reason behind our success. We didn’t chase over 200 too many times.”
BACK ROW (left-right):
Gary Butcher: Batsman who is the brother of Surrey’s Mark and son of Alan has been a sports coach at King’s College, Wimbledon for the last 12 years.
Andrew Jones: Batsman son of Alan and nephew of Eifion. Went into teaching and is head of PE at Monmouth School.
Jamie Bishop: Swansea-born left-handed batsman has worked as a pharmaceutical rep in South Wales since retiring.
Adrian Shaw: Keeper-batsman who also played for Wales has coached at Glamorgan and is Neath’s director of cricket.
Gareth Rees: Bristol born batsman is now earning his living by working in the City of London.
Scott Purdie: All-rounder now living in Auckland, New Zealand. Works as a fireman at Auckland Airport having previously been in airport security.
Ewan Holland: All-rounder who is back living in his native Hereford and is a director of Chase Oak Property.
Owen Parkin: Seamer became housemaster as a maths teacher at Canford School, Dorset.
Darren Thomas: All-rounder. Became an equipment designer with a bat firm and is now head coach of a coaching company formed with Simon Jones.
Alistair Dalton: Batsman who after leaving the game trained to be a pilot but has now retired. Was on Glamorgan committee.
MIDDLE ROW:
Dean Conway: He became England physio and now runs his own practice in Cardiff.
Byron Denning: First team scorer who lived in Ebbw Vale until his death in November 2001.
Steve James: England Test batsman, he went into the media and is now rugby correspondent of the Sunday Telegraph.
Roland Lefebvre: Dutch all-rounder. Stayed in the game as Dutch national youth coach and technical director for the senior men’s team.
Steven Bastien: London-born seamer has been the director of Facelift Electrical Services in Uxbridge, Middlesex, for the last seven years.
David Hemp: Left-handed Bermuda batsman is now a sports coach and the master in charge of cricket at Solihull School, Birmingham.
Adrian Dale: South African-born England A all-rounder moved to New Zealand where he is club and game development manager for the Auckland Cricket Association.
Tony Cottey: Right-handed bat who also served Sussex and played professional football for Swansea City. An after-dinner speaker and business relationship manager at Sussex.
Gwyn Stone: Retired as Glamorgan secretary in 1997.
Gordon Lewis: After a successful career in the RAF, training pilots, he became second team scorer and then first team scorer until his death in April 2004 aged 73.
FRONT ROW:
Alan Jones: An opening batsman between 1957 and 1983. He continued to serve Glamorgan as director of coaching until retirement in 1998 and has since worked in the media.
Mark Frost: Essex-born seamer. After being director of cricket to Cricket Wales and the director of Sport Wales he is now running his own company offering executive and life coaching.
Colin Metson: Wicketkeeper batsman also served Middlesex, worked for Sport Wales and Glamorgan, as director of cricket, but now owns Adventure Island in Barry.
Viv Richards: The West Indian batting genius played a football World Cup qualifier for Antigua. He has held mentoring roles and has worked in broadcasting.
Matthew Maynard: A batsman who played for England and is now director of cricket at Somerset CCC.
Hugh Morris: England batsman voted three times club player of the year before becaming managing director of the ECB is now chief executive and director of cricket at Glamorgan.
Steve Barwick: Seamer who became a nightwatchman at a hospital in his native Neath.
Steve Watkin: England fast bowler stayed on at Glamorgan firstly as academy director but now as bowling coach.
Robert Croft: An England spinner who was three times voted Glamorgan’s player of the year is now a spin bowling coach and ambassador for the county.
John Steele: Brother of David became assistant coach until 1997 when he joined the list of first class umpires until retirement.
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