Sadly BEA pilots of the time believe they were the best inspite of EIGHT crashes in my six years - 248 dead.
I can't comment on the abilities of BEA pilots, but you're surely not referring to the period 1967-1973, when the only other accidents where revenue passengers were killed involved a bomb (Comet, 1967, 66 fatalities) and structural failure (Vanguard, 1971, 63 killed) ?
Hard to see how piloting skills were relevant to those events.