Sussex by The Sea Part 1

 posted by John Winn

When in August 1972 I moved from my home town Darlington to Bexhill on Sea in East Sussex it was a significant move in many respects. Darlington still relied heavily on heavy engineering to provide employment while Bexhill, situated on the coast between Hastings and Eastbourne, was very much a retirement town with a disproportionate number of elderly people. Other differences included climate, accent and most importantly the organisation of club cricket. 

Within the first week in my new home I had contacted the local cricket club, Bexhill CC and on the following Saturday morning there was a knock on the door of the rented accommodation in St Leonard's on Sea where my then wife and I were living. At the door was 'Mr Bexhill CC', Michael Waghorn a man with whom I remain firm friends to this day. Would I like to play that afternoon for the first XI? Yes please and they can have been very few Saturdays in the cricket season for the next ten years when I did not play whether it was for the club's 1st, 2nd or 3rd elevens. 

I played that Saturday, August 26th 1972 and three things still come to mind about the game. I had a catch dropped off the first ball I bowled,  hit the winning run and we were won. The most obvious contrast with the previous Saturday when I had played for Cockerton CC in a Darlington and District league match at Barnard Castle was that Bexhill's match was a friendly, they were not to play league cricket for a further four years. Secondly after the match both teams adjourned to the club's licensed bar and thirdly I was asked if I would like to play again the next day, at home again but on a different ground and when I duly turned up the next day was surprised to find that at least half my team mates had not played on the Saturday. This was not unusual, some were Saturdays only, some only Sundays and some played for other clubs on Saturday but Bexhill's extensive Sunday programme allowed them to turn out twice at the weekend. 

This fixture list from 1982 demonstrates the opportunities there were for the keenest of cricketers to play not just at weekends but also midweek. With the main ground just a two minute walk from the beach 'Polegrove Sports Ground' was a popular venue with touring teams and when I joined the club in '72 the midweek list was even  more extensive. 

The cricket itself was different too, nearly all these matches were timed matches, with the outcome often being a draw. Wickets were generally fast and true, grounds were large and with clubs dependent on bar receipts for income clubs who did not stay for after match refreshment were not popular. In the D and D league grounds were much smaller, wickets greener and typically after a match the home team decamped to its local pub and the away team back to where they had come from and their own pub. 

League cricket, strongly resisted by some, had started in Sussex in 1971 and clubs that resisted the trend found it harder to arrange a satisfactory Saturday list. So in 1975 and with some misgivings Bexhill entered the East Sussex League and two years later The Sussex League. This latter move meant playing on grounds on which county cricket had been or was still played. Eastbourne, Hastings, Worthing, Chichester and Horsham for example. The downside was the travelling, Bexhill to Chichester, the longest trip, was 60 miles on a county's roads where motorways were almost non existent.

This card shows that by 1982 I had risen to the dizzy heights of club chairman, a job I did not enjoy, and it is  not coincidence that it was my last playing season. In that season I alternated between second and third elevens and it gradually dawned on me that I was playing a disproportionate number of away games. My last match was against Chichester III, away of course, and I remember being caught at slip for not many.  And so I became a spectator rather than a player but that's a story for next time.