Double Headers

32 other counties at home without leaving Kennington, as well as fitting in away fixtures against all counties and the two Universities. But things came to a crunch in 1912. The visits of both Australia and South Africa for the Triangular Tournament – for both of whom a full county programme was also arranged - meant that the Surrey club was faced with a clear, if perhaps unpalatable, choice. With one Test match to fit in at The Oval as well as two county fixtures against each of the tourists, an early-season Test Trial, and a late-season (and late-arranged) fixture between a combined Surrey and Middlesex XI and the Australians, Surrey CCC concluded that they could not fit in matches at The Oval against all the other 15 counties together with one or both of the Universities. The choice was therefore to forfeit their proud record of achieving a ’full set’ of county fixtures for longer than any other county (subject to the exceptions already noted), or to contemplate playing some home matches away from The Oval, and/or to double up some of their fixtures as they had done in 1909. This time there seems to have been no discussion on these options. Instead, the decision was taken to give up fixtures, both home and away, with Derbyshire and Somerset (who, by coincidence or not, had both finished in the bottom three of the Championship table in 1911). 27 And all fixtures against the Universities were also dropped, thus breaking a tradition of playing one or other University – and often both – in each season going back to 1859. 28 And so the chance of repeating either of the 1909 ventures was finally lost, for better or for worse. Probably for better, to judge from the reaction to the 1909 ‘experiment’. Surrey away from The Oval after 1909 Reigate Priory CC hosted four more first-class fixtures between 1924 and 1936, but none were Surrey fixtures. 29 It was not until 1938 – another Australian tour year – that Surrey once again decided that first-class cricket should be taken to an out-ground in the county. This time the favour fell on the Woodbridge Road ground at Guildford, as it did also in the following year. After the Second World War, both Guildford and Kingston – historic county town and administrative HQ of Surrey respectively – pressed Surrey CCC to incorporate a ‘county week’ at their venues into their fixture list. The 27 Surrey never again achieved a ‘full set’ of county fixtures until the days of the two-division Championship. They and Lancashire had both done so in 1910 and 1911, but the next instance by any county was not until 1923, by Yorkshire. Since then, full sets in the single-division Championship have been achieved only by Yorkshire and Lancashire in 1925 and 1926, by Notts in 1928, by Sussex in 1933 and 1935, by Sussex and Lancashire in 1937, and by eight counties in each year from 1960 to 1962: Glamorgan, Hampshire, Lancashire, Somerset, Sussex, Warwickshire, Worcestershire and Yorkshire. 28 The break in matches between Surrey and the Universities did not last long: Surrey played matches against one or both Universities in each season from 1919 until 1973 inclusive. Subsequently, fixtures between Surrey and the Universities have continued on an irregular basis only. 29 All four matches featured a team brought together by H.D.G.Leveson Gower, who played the touring South Africans in 1924, and Oxford University in 1934, 1935 and 1936. Surrey in 1909