More Warwickshire memories

 Posted by Tony Hutton

Thanks to John Winn for his last two posts which perhaps take our minds off the unfortunate events concerning Yorkshire County Cricket club. Much more on that in due course no doubt when the dust settles on the current hiatus, if it ever does.

John's story on Jack Parsons certainly rekindled memories for me as, believe it or not, I actually saw him play. I think I have written before about a match I saw at Edgbaston way back in April 1951 between Warwickshire and an Old England XI. However I have so far been unable to find it on our archive. Anyway the Rev. Canon J.H. Parsons appeared in this game at the ripe old age of 60. He was often talked about in those days as a famous pre-war big hitter whose speciality was hoisting the ball over the old pavilion across the road into the region of Cannon Hill Park.

On this occasion he did not repeat the feat, but scored 15 before being bowled by a young whipper snapper called Jack Bannister, who of course much later wrote the history of Warwickshire which John referred to in his blog. Other former Warwickshire players in the Old England XI were R.E.S. (Bob) Wyatt still playing for Worcestershire at the time a few days before his 50th birthday and even older E.J. (Tiger) Smith the wicket keeper who became county coach, who was already 65.

Here is the team picture which John mentioned from 1914 which includes not only Parsons and Smith but one of the umpires from the 1951 game, the famous Warwickshire batsman W.G. Quaife, then aged 79. Sadly he died a few months after the game in 1951. Quaife had a remarkable career with Warwickshire making a century on debut in 1894 and another in his last game at the age of 56 in 1928. This final innings was by the oldest cricketer ever to score a championship century. During that time he accumulated over 36,000 runs and played seven times for England. A famous man indeed.

Some other notables in this well remembered game from seventy years ago include the other umpire Alex Skelding, opening bowlers Fred Root and Alf Gover, Errol Holmes of Surrey who captained the side, together with two Surrey team mates Laurie Fishlock and Donald Knight. The last named player will mean very little to most cricket followers of today, but not only did he score a century in the game in 1951 at the age of 57, but had played twice for England way back in 1921 some thirty years earlier.

For the record the game was played on a time basis, well before limited overs games came into fashion. Warwickshire made 214-6 declared in 60 overs, with a century from Jimmy Ord a batsman from Northumberland. In reply Old England made a valiant attempt at victory but finished just eight runs short with 8 wickets down in 55 overs. Another young pace bowler Ray Carter took two wickets in the first over of the innings and young Bannister did even better with 5-43. Knight's wonderful 112 came in 115 minutes with eighteen fours.

Warwickshire 1951 champions.

The practice match must have given Warwickshire some sort of impetus as they went on to win the County Championship that year for the first time in forty years.