Cricket's Historians

132 Roy Webber and the Society of Cricket Statisticians – one actually materialised, The Graces by A.G.Powell and S.Canynge Caple. Another had just appeared: Glamorgan C.C.C. 1921-1947 by Roy Webber and Kenneth M.Arnott. This 176 page book was comprehensive, giving long descriptions of each first-class season and annual players’ statistics. A second edition had six pages added when Glamorgan won the Championship in 1948. A record section gives career figures for all Glamorgan players and a fair selection of the county’s records in general. The bowling averages for each season give columns for balls per wicket and runs per 100 balls. C.M.Oliver is acknowledged for his help in checking the statistics and as he also was the compiler of the Pamphlet no.1 mentioned above, a brief biographical note is appropriate here. Charles Morley Oliver, born in Southport in 1923, was by profession a statistician specialising in economics. He was appointed Lancashire’s official statistician in 1948 and contributed to the Lancashire Yearbook in that capacity until 1986. In addition he compiled season by season averages for many players and these figures were destined to appear regularly in publications of the Statisticians Society. Oliver moved from Lancashire to Hendon, Middlesex after the Second World War and played cricket for Hendon Buccaneers. He was an assiduous attender of meetings held by The Cricket Society and by The Association of Cricket Statisticians. He died in Mill Hill in May 2004. Before describing the new Playfair Annual , which had been advertised by the Cricket Book Society, it is worth returning to 1946 and taking up the story of the pocket-size pre-war cricket annuals, which were revived. The 1939 Athletic News Cricket Annual was the 48 th edition. It reappeared in 1946 (49 th edition) but retitled Athletic News Cricket and Golf Annual . The editor remained Ivan Sharpe. It contained 85 cricket pages and 44 on golf. The cricket section was mostly first-class records, but the scores of the 1945 Victory Tests are given and the leading 1945 first-class averages. The fixtures for the major Northern Leagues are included as well as those for the leading Home Counties Clubs. In 1947 the annual became the Sunday Chronicle Cricket and Golf Annual , continuing as such until 1954. The final edition, in 1955, dropped the golf section. Ivan Sharpe