from these tiny seedlings will grow graceful willows not planted simply to please the eye but for a specific purpose for this is Suffolk a sensor of the cricket bat industry here in lovely green meadows alongside running streams willows grow in their thousands and in this nursery young saplings are carefully brought to maturity when the tree is about ten to twelve years old it's in the ideal state for making bats having been checked that it's the right size trunk must be ten feet long the experts arrive to bring it down this tree should provide two dozen blades which is about the average one giant in Essex standing over a hundred feet made more than 1,100 you the manufacturer of the cricket bat is a curious blend of old traditions and modern methods to be expected perhaps in a trade 200 years old for instance the splitting of the wood here is always done by hand never by machine then the blades will be graded as just another stage in a long process before the wood block becomes the familiar bat the willow blade is naturally tough but it must be made harder this machine does the job with a 600-pound pressure when the blade has been shaped it is ready for the splicing of the handle this is made of sarawak cane into which layers of rubber a place to give extra power the splice will be so neatly fitted that even left unglued a match could be played without the handle coming up there are strict rules about the size of the bat due to the easygoing regulations in the games early days when betting was common side stakes of a thousand pounds were common with those sort of sums in the balance some unsporting gents would open the innings with a bat so wide it would completely hide the stops the final touches cannot be given by machine a craftsman strained eye and instinctive feel for the right shape and balance does the job of shaping the bat swiftly and well you the cricket bat is almost finished twine binds the handle to give it the traditional grip 12 years of passed since the tree was planted from which this bat was fashioned a dozen years of care and skill giving the ideal product a cricket bat shape for surroundings like this