Colin Crosby Heritage Tours

All Time Best Essex XI

Members of Essex County Cricket Club have been voting for their all time best team, and the club have now announced the results.

This is the resulting best team.

Graham Gooch; Alastair Cook; Nasser Hussain; Mark Waugh; Keith Fletcher (captain); Trevor Bailey; James Foster (wicket keeper); Peter Smith; Neil Foster; Ray East; John Lever.

Two of this eleven, Cook and James Foster, are members of the present Essex team. I saw all of them playing, except the late Peter Smith, who had retired before I started watching the club.

As a former Essex member myself (I am now a Leicestershire member), my own team would have been almost identical, except that it would definitely have included the late Keith Boyce.

And I would have tried, probably unsuccessfully, to find places for Ken McEwan, Allan Border, Robin Hobbs and Danish Kaneria.