100 Years Ago: 10 September 1924

Cricket mourns Lees as Allen shines at Scarborough

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The former Surrey right-arm fast-medium bowler Walter Lees died this morning in West Hartlepool of double pneumonia at the age of 47.  He was a fine bowler of great stamina who took 193 first-class wickets in 1905, and played five Test matches for England in South Africa the following winter.

Day 1

Scarborough Festival: C I Thornton’s XI v South Africans

Allen Bowls Out Tourists

SOUTH AFRICANS 143 (M J Susskind 21, A W Nourse 25, H W Taylor 21, J M Blanckenberg 37*; G O B Allen 7/61, A S Kennedy 2/50). C I THORNTON’S XI 83/2 (J C W MacBryan 20, P Holmes 41*, E H Hendren 15*; S J Pegler 2 wkts).

Charles Thornton picked a strong team, captained by Johnny Douglas, to play the South Africans in the final match of their wet, difficult and exhausting tour, ten of his players having had Test experience.  It was the one player who hasn’t, Gubby Allen, who gave the tourists the most trouble with a superb fast-bowling performance on a pitch that was quite fast apart from a couple of damp spots, but otherwise gave him little help, though he also swung the ball in the air.  The very heavy outfield after much rain did hinder the tourists, though, who were rarely able to reach the boundary during their innings.  They lost their openers for 15 runs on the board, and their next three major batsmen, Fred Susskind, Dave Nourse and Herby Taylor, all reached the twenties but could go no further before Allen dismissed them, and also bowled Bob Catterall first ball.  Five of his wickets were bowled out, one lbw and Taylor caught at the wicket.  All the batsmen struggled against him, but the highest scorer was Jimmy Blanckenberg, with 37 not out from No 7.  Alec Kennedy and Charlie Parker supported Allen well.

Thornton’s team had just over an hour to bat, and Percy Holmes immediately showed himself to be in fine form with a four and a three off the first over.  He had reached the highest score of the day by the close, although he lost Jack MacBryan, batting with an injured thumb, for 20 and Ernest Tyldesley for 7, both lbw to Sid Pegler.  The day was generally bright and sunny, but with a cold northeast wind, and there were about 6000 spectators.

John Ward is an ACS member and a long-serving Zimbabwean cricket statistician. If you would like to contribute to this newsletter, please either respond to the email in which you received it, or leave a comment below.