By Mike Latham
Hidden away a few hundred yards from one of the
busiest motorway sections in Western Europe is a little green oasis and a
beautiful village cricket ground.
Close to the newly developed RHS Bridgewater Garden in
Worsley, Roe Green CC play at the Beesley Green ground, their roots traced back
to the 1880s when the club was set up for the villagers.
Roe Green CC
Lord Ellesmere gifted the club their present ground in
1902, in exchange for a nominal rent of one shilling yearly, and he also paid
for the enclosing of the site. In later years, the club was able to buy the
ground from Bridgewater Estates and in the late 1960s obtain a licence for the
club house. Prior to that there was a reluctance to do that as Roe Green was a
Methodist village, its most famous son, JT Tyldesley a teetotaller.
Over the years the club has overcome problems with
drainage and subsidence as five pit and air shafts exist in the immediate area.
The air shafts date back to the construction of the underground canal at
Worsley.
League
cricket came late to Roe Green, as the club played friendlies only until
joining the Bolton & District Association in the early 1950s. More recently
they became founder members of the Greater Manchester Cricket League and play
in the Premier Division.
Horses graze as Roe Green bat first against Walsden
Horses grazed behind the bowler’s arm at one end as
Roe Green entertained Walsden, from the Lancashire League, in the first round
of the LCB Lancashire Knock-Out Cup, a tranquil scene disturbed only by the constant
buzz of motorway traffic from the M60 in the near distance and the occasional
shouts of the players.
With heavy rain forecast for later in the afternoon it
was always unlikely the game would reach an uninterrupted conclusion and so it
proved. Roe Green, invited to bat, mustered 102 and the visitors were 51 for 5
when play was brought to a halt. I consulted the handy Duckworth Lewis
calculator on the Bolton League website which showed that Roe Green were
victors by a narrow margin.
The Duckworth Lewis calculator on the Bolton League site
The club is renowned in cricket circles as the home of
the famous Tyldesley brothers. Johnny and Ernest Tyldesley both played for Roe
Green, Lancashire and England and fellow siblings Frank, Austin and Jesse also
played for the club.
JT Tyldesley
Johnny (JT) Tyldesley was born at Roe Green in 1873
and at the time of his death at the age of 57 was rated in obituary notices as ‘the
most famous professional batsman Lancashire has ever produced.’
He hit an unbeaten 152 against Warwickshire in only
his second first-class match in 1895 and went on to score nearly 38,000 runs at
an average of over 40, including 86 centuries. He played 507 matches for the
county.
He scored three Test centuries against the Australians
in this country, but critics reckoned he was not at his best in the Test arena.
In 31 Tests he scored 1,661 runs at a shade over 30, a relatively modest record
for someone of his ability. He recorded 1,000 runs in 19 consecutive seasons,
surpassing 3,000 runs (3,041) in the 1901 season.
‘JT’ was a brisk scorer of runs, displaying quickness,
great footwork and a wide variety of stroke play, particularly favouring the
square and late cut and off drive. There were few more attractive batsmen to
watch, and he was also an excellent fielder and a particular favourite of the
cricket writer, Neville Cardus.
He later became Lancashire coach and was in partnership
in a famous sports’ outfitters in Manchester, Tyldesley and Holbrook. Described
as a ‘Lancastrian to the core’ during his playing days, but extremely modest,
it was said that ‘he spoke through his bat.’
Ernest Tyldesley
Ernest was born in 1889, made his Lancashire debut in
1909, and after the first world war emerged as a batsman of the front rank. An
exceptional exponent of the hook shot, also renowned for the way he mastered
the late cut, he was admired for the extreme courtesy he showed on and off the
field.
Emulating his brother in surpassing 3,000 runs in a
season (3,024 in 1928), he amassed 102 centuries in scoring 38,874 first-class
runs at an average of over 45 and hit three Test hundreds, scoring 990 runs at
an average of 55 in 14 Tests.
The Tyldesley brothers featured in the Athletic News, 1913
Ernest’s final first-class season was in 1936, when he
was called up for the Roses match at Headingley after ‘assisting the Roe Green
club’ and then playing the last of 573 matches for Lancashire against Surrey at
Old Trafford. He remains the most prolific Lancashire batsman in terms of first-class
runs scored in a county career (34,222 at 45.20). JT is second in the list (31,949
runs at 41.38).
With three senior teams, a girls and women’s section and
a strong junior set-up there may well be more players at Roe Green waiting to
be unearthed to follow in that great tradition of the Tyldesley brothers.
A visit to this beautiful and historic cricket ground comes highly recommended.
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