BOOK SHELF The Turner tons

Press, 9 February 1983, Page 26

BOOK SHELF The Turner tons

The greatest New Zealand batsman’s greatest feat had to be recorded. In GLENN TURNER’S CENTURY OF CENTURIES, by Ray Cairns and Glen Turner (Hodder and Stoughton; 280 pp; $16.95), the cricketer and the Christchurch journalist have combined perfectly to produce an excellent account of two decades of cricket. The format is first-class. Each of Turner's centuries is treated separately. Cairns sets the scene, and Turner talks about the innings. Glenn Turner is not only a master batsman. He is a clear and clever thinker about the game, and his observations on colleagues

and opponents, on the stale of the game, are highly interesting. There is a preliminary chapter which can be recommended particularly: “A Philosophy of Batsmanship." which deserves inclusion in all future text-books on cricket. The situations which Turner has criticised, and which have brought critism of Turner, are not overlooked — the running battle with the New Zealand Cricket Council, and the lan Chappell . incident at Lancaster Park are among them. Turner is extraordinarily frank about these and other matters.

The main interest, how-

ever, is in watching the development of the Turner technique as the chapters appear. It is almost like looking through a family photograph album.

The book is very well illustrated, with plenty of action photographs, including a good many of Turners Worcestershire contemporaries.

The end papers are most attractive, recording the hundred centuries with the scores, the opposition, the venue and the year.

"Glenn Turner's Century of Centuries" is a must for all admirers of this great craftsman, and all those who love the game. — R.T.B.