Playfair Cricket Annual is a compact annual about cricket that is published in the United Kingdom each April, just before the English cricket season is due to begin. It has been published every year since 1948. Its main purposes are to review the previous English season and to provide detailed career records and potted biographies of current players. It is produced in a "pocket-sized" format, being approximately 5×4 in (i.e., about 13×10 cm), so that it is a convenient size for carrying to cricket matches. The front cover of each edition has featured a photograph of a prominent current cricketer. There is a popular myth that this "honour" has a "hex"Playfair Cricket Annual 2000, p. 8 or "curse"Playfair Cricket Annual 2005, p. 2 associated with it, as the player featured then invariably has a poor season.
Publications The original publisher was Playfair Books Ltd of London, which had its office at Curzon Street when the first edition was published in April 1948; the company relocated soon afterwards to Haymarket. The name Playfair was chosen because it reads as "play fair", as confirmed by C B Fry who began his foreword to the first edition in 1948: "This Playfair Annual (and what a proper title for a book about the Noble Game) will commend itself to innumerable readers".Playfair Books Cricket Annual 1948, p. 3 The first editor was Peter West who was succeeded in 1954 by Gordon Ross.Playfair Cricket Annual 1954 Roy Webber was the statistician at Playfair for many years and was described by West as "that ace of statisticians".Playfair Cricket Annual 1952, p. 3
The Playfair Cricket Annual is one of a series of similar pocket sized sporting annuals published under the Playfair name. Others have included Playfair Football Annual, Playfair Rugby League Annual and Playfair Racing Annual. In addition the Playfair name was used for record books produced by Roy Webber and for the magazine Playfair Cricket Monthly. A number of tour brochures were also produced by Playfair Books.
Between 1948 and 1962 the annual was a larger size, 4¾×7¼ in (12×18 cm) and had a different style, being printed on glossy paper and including numerous photographs. In 1962 the Playfair titles were acquired by Dickens Press which had just published The Cricket Annual, edited by Roy Webber. In 1963, Dickens published a new style Playfair Cricket Annual, keeping the same name but basing the size, format and price on The Cricket Annual. Therefore, the 2013 edition is the 66th in total, but the annual has been published in its current compact size only since the 1963 edition (the 16th).Playfair Cricket Annual 1963
In addition, Playfair Cricket World Cup Guide, in 1996, and Playfair Cricket World Cup 1999 were published in the same format as the regular annual to cover the International limited overs competitions in India/Pakistan/Sri Lanka and England/Scotland/Ireland/Netherlands in those years respectively. Both of those were also edited by Bill Frindall.
The current publisher is Headline Publishing Group with Ian Marshall, who succeeded Bill Frindall on an acting basis in 2009 and permanently for the 2010 edition, as editor. There are several specialist contributors, notably Philip Bailey who compiles the career records.Playfair Cricket Annual 2008, p. 3
The following tables provide a summary of each annual by reference to editor, size and price:
Larger format: 1948–1962
Year Editor Price Pages 1948 Peter West 3s 6d 144 1949 Peter West 3s 6d 144 1950 Peter West 3s 6d 176 1951 Peter West 3s 6d 176 1952 Peter West 5s 184 1953 Peter West 5s 192 1954 Gordon Ross 5s 176 1955 Gordon Ross 5s 176 1956 Gordon Ross 5s 176 1957 Gordon Ross 5s 176 1958 Gordon Ross 5s 176 1959 Gordon Ross 6s 176 1960 Gordon Ross 6s 176 1961 Gordon Ross 6s 176 1962 Gordon Ross 6s 176
In each of the first 15 editions there was a 16-page photographic section in addition to the numbered pages. The 1948 annual was actually called Playfair Books Cricket Annual but subsequent years were simply called Playfair Cricket Annual. There were two issues of the 1948 annual with a difference in the back cover. One had a Playfair logo, the other a Schweppes advertisement.Playfair Books Cricket Annual 1948
Compact format: 1963–present
For the forerunners to the annual in this format see The Cricket Annual.
Year Editor Cricketer(s) on Front Cover Cricketer(s) on Back Cover Price Pages 1963 Gordon Ross Garfield Sobers n/a 2s 6d 192 1964 Gordon Ross Bob Simpson n/a 2s 6d 224 1965 Gordon Ross Ken Barrington n/a 2s 6d 224 1966 Gordon Ross Wes Hall n/a 3s 224 1967 Gordon Ross Brian Close n/a 3s 224 1968 Gordon Ross Basil d'Oliveira n/a 3s 6d 224 1969 Gordon Ross Alan Knott n/a 3s 6d 224 1970 Gordon Ross John Edrich n/a 4s 224 1971 Gordon Ross John Snow n/a 20p 224 1972 Gordon Ross Geoff Boycott n/a 22p 224 1973 Gordon Ross Tony Greig n/a 25p 224 1974 Gordon Ross Bishen Bedi n/a 35p 224 1975 Gordon Ross Dennis Amiss n/a 50p 212 1976 Gordon Ross Clive Lloyd n/a 50p 224 1977 Gordon Ross Dennis Lillee n/a 60p 224 1978 Gordon Ross Mike Brearley n/a 65p 224 1979 Gordon Ross Ian Botham n/a 75p 224 1980 Gordon Ross Graham Gooch n/a 90p 240 1981 Gordon Ross Geoff Boycott n/a £1 240 1982 Gordon Ross Allan Lamb n/a £1.10 256 1983 Gordon Ross David Gower n/a £1.25 256 1984 Gordon Ross Viv Richards n/a £1.50 256 1985 Gordon Ross Paul Downton n/a £1.75 256 1986 Bill Frindall Allan Border n/a £1.75 256 1987 Bill Frindall John Emburey n/a £1.75 256 1988 Bill Frindall Graeme Hick n/a £1.75 256 1989 Bill Frindall Jack Russell n/a £1.75 256 1990 Bill Frindall Angus Fraser n/a £1.99 256 1991 Bill Frindall Robin Smith n/a £2.50 256 1992 Bill Frindall Phillip DeFreitas n/a £2.99 256 1993 Bill Frindall Alec Stewart n/a £3.99 256 1994 Bill Frindall Mike Atherton n/a £3.99 256 1995 Bill Frindall Darren Gough n/a £4.50 288 1996 Bill Frindall Wasim Akram n/a £4.99 288 1997 Bill Frindall Shane Warne & Graham Thorpe n/a £4.99 288 1998 Bill Frindall Nasser Hussain Hansie Cronje £4.99 288 1999 Bill Frindall Mark Ramprakash Allan Donald & Mike Atherton £4.99 288 2000 Bill Frindall Andy Caddick Jack Russell & Mark Alleyne £5.99 288 2001 Bill Frindall Steve Waugh Mike Atherton & Alec Stewart £5.99 304 2002 Bill Frindall Marcus Trescothick Michael Vaughan £5.99 304 2003 Bill Frindall Andrew Flintoff Mark Butcher £5.99 304 2004 Bill Frindall Michael Vaughan Brian Lara £6.99 304 2005 Bill Frindall Steve Harmison The Ashes Urn £6.99 304 2006 Bill Frindall Andrew Flintoff England team celebrating Ashes victory £6.99 320 2007 Bill Frindall Ian Bell Sachin Tendulkar £6.99 320 2008 Bill Frindall Monty Panesar Stephen Fleming £6.99 320 2009 Bill Frindall* Ricky Ponting Kevin Pietersen £6.99 336 2010 Ian Marshall Andrew Strauss James Anderson £6.99 336 2011 Ian Marshall Graeme Swann England Ashes winning team with the Ashes urn £7.99 336 2012 Ian Marshall Kevin Pietersen Andrew Strauss holding ICC Test mace £7.99 336 2013 Ian Marshall Alastair Cook Matt Prior £7.99 336 2014 Ian Marshall Stuart Broad Ian Bell £8.99 336 2015 Ian Marshall Joe Root Michael Clarke £8.99 336 2016 Ian Marshall Ben Stokes Moeen Ali £8.99 336 2017 Ian Marshall Jonny Bairstow Chris Woakes £9.99 336 2018 Ian Marshall James Anderson Heather Knight £9.99 352 2019 Ian Marshall Jos Buttler Sam Curran £9.99 352 2020 Ian Marshall Jofra Archer Eoin Morgan £9.99 352 2021 Ian Marshall Zak Crawley Joe Root £9.99 336 2022 Ian Marshall Adil Rashid Heather Knight £10.99 352 2023 Ian Marshall Sam Curran Ollie Robinson £10.99 352 2024 Ian Marshall Harry Brook Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes £10.99 352 2025 Ian Marshall Jamie Smith Virat Kohli £10.99 352 2026 Ian Marshall Ben Duckett Gus Atkinson £10.99 352
Bill Frindall died shortly before the 2009 annual was completed, but received sole credit as editor on the front cover. The acknowledgements page credits Ian Marshall as "acting editor". Frindall's traditional preface was written by Jonathan Agnew.
From the 1998 edition onwards a thumbnail picture also appeared on the spine of the annual. This had been a smaller version of the front cover photograph except in 1998 and 2008, when it was the back cover picture, and in 2006, 2010 and 2023 when the Ashes urn was depicted.
Compact format: World Cup Guides Year Editor Cricketers on Front Cover Cricketer on Back Cover and spine Price Pages 1996 Bill Frindall Allan Donald & Brian Lara n/a £4.99 256 1999 Bill Frindall Arjuna Ranatunga & Glenn McGrath Sanath Jayasuriya £4.99 288
Apart from those on the covers, there are no photographs in any of the annuals from 1963.
Eleven cricketers of the year From 1950 to 1962 the annual produced a list of its Eleven Cricketers of the Year for the previous season. Tony Lock was selected 7 times, Peter May 6 times.
1950: Trevor Bailey, Freddie Brown, Tom Burtt, Martin Donnelly, Tom Goddard, Walter Hadlee, Len Hutton, Roly Jenkins, John Langridge, Reg Simpson, Bert Sutcliffe 1951: Godfrey Evans, Laurie Fishlock, Ken Grieves, Gilbert Parkhouse, Sonny Ramadhin, David Sheppard, Roy Tattersall, Alf Valentine, Everton Weekes, Frank Worrell, Doug Wright 1952: Bob Appleyard, Alec Bedser, Geoffrey Chubb, Denis Compton, Tom Dollery, Tom Graveney, Jim Laker, Peter May, Jack Robertson, Eric Rowan, Willie Watson 1953: Alec Bedser, Brian Close, Godfrey Evans, Tom Graveney, Len Hutton, Jim Laker, Tony Lock, Peter May, David Sheppard, Fred Trueman, Johnny Wardle 1954: Trevor Bailey, Alec Bedser, Bruce Dooland, Bill Edrich, Lindsay Hassett, Neil Harvey, Len Hutton, Ray Lindwall, Tony Lock, Peter May, David Sheppard 1955: Bob Appleyard, Denis Compton, Bruce Dooland, Les Jackson, Don Kenyon, Jim Laker, Peter Loader, Tony Lock, Fazal Mahmood, Brian Statham, Alan Watkins 1956: Colin Cowdrey, Bruce Dooland, Peter Heine, Doug Insole, Tony Lock, Jackie McGlew, Roy Marshall, Brian Statham, Hugh Tayfield, John Waite 1957: Denis Compton, Jim Laker, Gil Langley, Tony Lock, Peter May, Keith Miller, Peter Richardson, David Sheppard, Stuart Surridge, George Tribe, Cyril Washbrook 1958: Colin Cowdrey, Tom Graveney, Peter Loader, Tony Lock, Peter May, John Murray, Jim Parks, Derek Shackleton, MJK Smith, Collie Smith, Fred Trueman 1959: Dennis Brookes, Godfrey Evans, Colin Ingleby-Mackenzie, Les Jackson, Tony Lock, Roy Marshall, Peter May, Arthur Milton, Derek Shackleton, Raman Subba Row, Willie Watson 1960: Abbas Ali Baig, Trevor Bailey, Ken Barrington, Ronnie Burnet, Colin Cowdrey, Ray Illingworth, Jim Parks, Geoff Pullar, MJK Smith, Jim Stewart, Bryan Stott 1961: Trevor Bailey, Ted Dexter, Norman Horner, Henry Horton, Tony Lewis, Alan Moss, Michael Norman, Eric Russell, Brian Statham, Fred Trueman, Peter Wight 1962: Bill Alley, Richie Benaud, Jack Flavell, Colin Ingleby-Mackenzie, Bill Lawry, Ken Mackay, Roy Marshall, John Murray, Peter Parfitt, Derek Shackleton, Raman Subba Row
County register, averages, and records Since the first compact edition of 1963, the core of the publication has been a section providing a county by county list of current cricketers with potted biographies, their county averages in the previous season together with some introductory notes on the county and the major county records.
The county clubs are listed in alphabetical order. Until 1962, the biographies occupied less space and were not sorted by county club. Introductory information about each county club has expanded, largely because of the introduction of limited overs cricket competitions. A much longer list of officials is now given; originally only the secretary and captain were given. Until 1972 most editions gave potted scores for each club's home matches but lack of space caused this to be removed.
Current contents Currently, the annual's contents typically include:Playfair Cricket Annual 2010, p. 1 Preface, Foreword and Acknowledgements Test Cricket Details of England's records against the touring teams Register of the touring teams Statistical highlights of the previous year Scorecards of the previous year