‘Cricket! A Grand Match’
Martin Chandler |Published: 2022
Pages: 16
Author: Tebay, Martin
Publisher: Red Rose Books
Rating: 3.5 stars
Many years ago, on a school trip, I made the short trip by ferry from Heysham to the Isle of Man. It is an island, Wikipedia tells me, of 221 square miles with a population of 84,000. I was a cricket lover even then, but to the best of my recollection I didn’t give the game a moment’s thought during that trip to the island, involving as it did a couple of visits to museums and a drive in the coach around the historic and, on a powerful motorcycle extremely dangerous, 37 mile mountain circuit that is the setting for the island’s claim to fame, the TT race meeting.
I don’t even recall noticing a cricket ground, but the game is clearly played on the island, although a glance through the excellent cricketarchive website doesn’t contain a great deal of information. I have never seen any sort of book on Manx cricket, and the pages of the various incarnations of the game’s bibliography, Padwick, do not suggest there are any books on the subject.
There is an Isle of Man Cricket Association, and that has a website. From that I learn that there are currently eight senior clubs on the island, but there is nothing historical on the site. If this, the fifth in Martin Tebay’s Against the Odds series of monographs (and the first for five years) achieved nothing else it certainly made me realise that a history of cricket on the island would be a book I would like to read. For the avoidance of any doubt this is not that book, but it is certainly responsible for sowing a seed.
What ‘Cricket! A Grand Match’ does do is go back to 1888 and what would appear to be the first time that First Class players from the mainland visited the island. The team that arrived for the match were not quite Lancashire’s strongest side, as neither Johnny Briggs nor Frank Sugg travelled, but the rest were a decent side, led by county captain ‘Monkey’ Hornby, and containing eight of the county’s professional staff. The opposition comprised 22 men from the island.
The booklet has a two page introduction followed by a detailed account of the two day match followed by the scorecard. The match clearly attracted great interest on the island and contemporary newspapers are the main source of the story. The game not appearing on cricketarchive I have decided not to rob others of the opportunity that I had to read the account without knowing how the story would unfold so, to learn the outcome, a purchase will be necessary.
But I will make one other observation and, having proposed one writing project, it involves suggesting another. Something else I have never seen in the past, and again I do not believe such a book exists, is something on the subject of against odds games generally. I was under the impression that if eleven play a greater number, that the latter will all bat, but there would never be more than eleven in the field. In 1888 it seems all 22 Manxmen fielded, so batting for the county side was not as easy as it might have been. A history/survey of the many against odds matches there have been would therefore, once again, be something I would like to read.
The obscure nature of the story it tell means ‘Cricket! A Grand Match’ is never going to be a bestseller, but it is nonetheless an interesting and thought provoking monograph that I have no doubt will quickly sell out its short print run. For those wanting to be amongst the 28 who have a copy of the booklet it is available directly from the publisher for £6.99 including UK postage and packing.
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