'Cricket books should meet one or more of these necessary requirements, being either literate and amusing to read, or meticulously researched, or original in concept. Tim Heald's THE CHARACTER OF CRICKET triumphantly meets all three', said Benny Green in 1986. Nearly twenty years later, Tim Heald has identified some of the clubs and grounds that capture the essence of English village cricket - Great Tew in Oxfordshire, Bocannoc in Cornwall, Bray in Berkshire, Burpham in West Sussex, Bolton Percy in Yorkshire, Hagley in the West Midlands, Mawdsley in Lancashire, Great Bentley in Essex and Aldestrop in Gloucestershire are some of the villages that embody the national psyche, from northern grit to bucolic or prettified. Tim Heald tells the narrative of a match in each village as a backdrop to a mix of information, history and anecdote that is literally about 'the grass roots'.