At junior school (Kinsale Avenue in Hellesdon) we didn't have a cricket team as such and I can only remember one game against another school when I was asked to captain the team. This was based on the fact that the teacher who took us for cricket (Mr London) could never get me out. I never scored any runs against him but doggedly stopped him from getting my wicket. That was all because of hour after hour of practice in both my front garden and on Hellesdon Recreation Ground.
At the Norwich School they did have cricket teams at all age groups. I represented the school at Under-11 and Under-12 levels but then gave the sport up in preference for playing tennis. I still remember that as one of the toughest decisions of my life. You couldn't play both and so I had to chose between two sports I loved playing. Tennis just got the edge as I felt I had more chance of making the school's senior team in that sport and I did play for both the junior team and then the senior side.
But it did mean cricket had to take a back seat, although I was still called up for the house team in the inter-school knockout tournament. The only thing I could remember was having to bat against the school's fastest bowler who I believe was called Van Ree. I managed to keep him out but did another Mr London by not being able to score any runs. He was just a touch too fast for comfort and in those days nobody wore helmets!
Fast forward many years and games for various Round Tables including one in Long Eaton where I ran the team's star player out were followed by a number of games over many years for Hethersett. Primarily in the village I coached and helped with some of the youth teams. That all culminated in myself and my youngest son playing in the same team when he was about 12. We ended up batting together and I remember hitting a six. A few years later he became a proficient all-rounder for Hethersett and smote many a mighty six.
My playing career came to an end when I suffered ankle ligament damage in a match at Lowestoft. I just didn't see the ball. It took over three months for that to heal and I made one more effort to play but got injured on the other ankle when the ball hit me whilst fielding in the slips. It was at that point that I realised my eyesight just wasn't up to playing anymore and I hung my bat up!
I subsequently had periods as development officer and chairman of Hethersett and Tas Valley Cricket Club and today am an honorary Vice President of the club - an appointment I am very proud of.
But enough about me and my very very limited playing career. As mentioned I have been reading the book "More Than a Game - The Story of Cricket's Early Years" by John Major. It's a good social history as well as a history of the early years of the game.
To start with "playing at cricket" was frowned upon. It was an activity of the peasants and many found themselves before the courts for playing on a Sunday.
Then suddenly the game became the pastime of the gentry and it never looked back. many cricket clubs go back hundreds of years - comfortably pre-dating football clubs. Hethersett is one of those. The village club was founded in 1855 - making it 165 this year. It is likely, however, that some form of cricket was played in the village at least five years before this either on a piece of meadow along Melton Road or close to the back garden of the fromer Greyhound Public House in Henstead Road.
The following extract of the early days of Hethersett Cricket Club is taken from my Hethersett Herald website from where a full history of the club can be read. It shows that when it came to matches between Hethersett and Wymondham it was often not only sport that was at stake.
"The first match to leave its mark was a bizarre affair, rather pointing to the fact that an official Hethersett club was not at the time in being. It is unlikely that any properly set-up club would have countenanced the rather strange nature of this match which pitted Hethersett against Wymondham.
"The needle rivalry between the two teams suggests that there may well have been other games before this one. It was said that neither side would settle for a draw. If need arose they would put their two highest scorers in again to play a single wicket competition in order to gain the bragging rights.
"It is difficult to decide just why the rivalry existed between Hethersett and Wymondham. One explanation could have been a battle over land. Until the enclosures, a vast track of unenclosed land extended from Wymondham town to the boundary of Hethersett. Known as Wymondham Great Common, it was there the body of a dead man was found one day in the latter part of the 18th century. Because Wymondham allegedly spurned the obligation to bury the corpse, the parish of Hethersett, albeit resentfully, undertook the task and expense of so doing. But later, with the advent of the Enclosures of 1790, Hethersett claimed a large slice of the Great Common on the grounds of having buried the aforementioned corpse. The claim it appears was granted and, as it was said "Wymondham never quite forgave Hethersett for pulling a trick like that!
"Such was the mood of the teams that rain was not allowed to interfere. The match in question was accompanied by a steady downpour but neither side was prepared to abandon the game as a draw, the assumption being that the side which called "enough" would be deemed to have lost the match.
"So the game continued, leaving those who witnessed it with memories of drenched figures squelching over swamped meadow in pursuit of a sodden ball. Apart from the obvious "needle" between the two sides, it was liquid refreshment that served to sustain the spirits of the players. We have to assume that the umpire (if any) were either as partisan as the players or had very wisely abandoned them to fate.
"Unfortunately, despite all that dogged persistency, the result of the match is unknown. One of the Hethersett club’s greatest characters Fred Dodman told the story of the match which he had heard from one of the players, Amble Appleton:
“I don't know who won. I don't think they did either because from what I remember hearing about it, they were as soaked inside with beer as they were outside with rain." So we may at least safely assume that the only man who won anything that day, was the landlord of the Greyhound Public House.
The old and the young but united by the love of the game of cricket. On the left is Rick Critchfield who is still playing cricket with the Norfolk Cricketers in Retirement group at the age of 87 (88 next month) and on the right is my grandson Elliot who is playing for Hethersett and Tas Valley Under-9s at the age of seven. |