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Peter James SAINSBURY

Peter Sainsbury was the only man to play in both of Hampshire’s Championship winning sides as well as  win their first limited-overs trophy in 1975. He was coach when they won that competition again in 1978 and 1986 and also when they reached and won their first Lord’s Cup Final in 1988.

When he retired he had spent more than 40 years associated with Hampshire, having arrived at their headquarters in his native Southampton before his development was interrupted briefly by National Service. He returned to make his debut in 1954 as a slow-left-armer who could bat, in a period when Hampshire’s spin bowlers, Knott, Bailey, Hill and Dare were all coming to the end of their careers.

1955 was his first full season. Hampshire finished third for the first time in their history and Sainsbury took more than 100 wickets, including Len Hutton at Bradford twice on his 21st birthday. His batting improved gradually with a maiden First-Class century in 1958 when Hampshire were runners-up to Surrey. During the 1960s he passed 1,000 runs in six seasons and more than 900 in two others and he established himself at number five in the order.

During that decade, Hampshire had their finest ever pace attack of Shackleton, White and Cottam and Sainsbury did not always bowl as much as he may have wished. Nonetheless, when they won the title in 1961 he passed 1500 runs, took 54 wickets at 26.74 and held 46 catches in 34 matches – he was, in particular, a superb short leg fielder.

As the great pace bowlers departed, Sainsbury enjoyed an excellent conclusion to his bowling career, with 71 wickets in 1970 and 107 in 1971. In that latter season he was 52* on the penultimate day when Hampshire declared, leaving him fewer than 50 short of the double which no Hampshire player has achieved since 1948. In 1973, as vice-captain he played a key role in Hampshire’s second Championship title finishing third in the batting averages with a first century in nine years and second in the national averages with 49 wickets at less than 18 each.

Sainsbury was never a big spinner of the ball, nor was he a flamboyant stroke maker. He was, in every respect, a workmanlike cricketer who rarely took the eye but match after match and season after season he produced excellent performances which amounted to almost 20,000 first-class runs, 1,245 wickets and 601 catches. In his later years he was also a very effective cricketer in limited-overs matches, often bowling tight spells which somewhat anticipated the current effectiveness of slower bowlers but at a time when the norm was for captains to rely on medium pacers.

Those performances brought him four Man-of-the-Match awards including an incredible performance against Norfolk in 1965 with 76 runs and 7-30.

After his early successes he toured Pakistan with MCC ‘A’ in 1955/6 and there is a tale that he was considered as a replacement for England three years later. International honours never came, however, but he will be remembered as one of the most loyal, consistent and effective of Hampshire’s all-rounders... with the addition of his coaching role, perhaps the finest of them all?