A Man for a Crisis

by Brian Sanderson

Looking through Wisden for 1939 ,I noticed that Arthur Wood.,
 Yorkshire wicket keeper was one of the five cricketers of the year
 for 1938 which is not mentioned in Paul Dyson
new book Who's Who of The Yorkshire County Cricket Club.

Arthur Wood was born at Fagley which a district near Undercliffe
 in Bradford on 25 August 1898 and his first club was Eccleshill
 Parish Club. He was noticed by Yorkshire playing
for Bradford. His first class debut was in 1927 and then played 225

 consecutive first class matches before missing a  game
. When Les Ames got injured in August 1938 ,he was asked
 to debut for England just four days short of his 40 th birthday.
It states in Wisden that he was the oldest cricketer to make his
Test debut for England however this was not the case
. There was James Southertonin 1877 and Rockley Wilson in
1921 another Yorkshire man.

When Arthur Wood was informed he was playing, he was due
 to play for Yorkshire at Trent Bridge
. Yorkshire had five players in that  match but still managed to
 draw the match with Herbert Sutcliffe scoring a century.
  When Arthur came out to bat at The Oval the score
was 700 for 6 and his quote was "that he was a man for a crisis"
 and went on to score a quick 53 .During the partnership
with Hammond ,Bradman injured his ankle and did not bat in
 the Test match which helped England win by a innings
 and 579 runs.

After the Second World War Arthur Wood his last Yorkshire
 match was  in 1946 and then went to play for Undercliffe
and Jack Appleyards X1 .He played 408 matches for Yorkshire
scoring 8579 runs and taking 852 victims.