History of Bucks CCC

managed only three. Hired as a leg spinner after four years with Sussex, Clarke had also been at the centre of the drama at Penrith when he had captured two Cumberland wickets in three balls in his final over. Wicket-keeper Tim Russell remembers the dismissal that brought victory: “He suddenly bowled a bouncer off four or five paces that the batsman tried to fend off his helmet. It flicked his glove and went for a catch to slip.” In his first season Clarke captured 48 of the 102 wickets to fall to bowlers. His heyday came in the narrow loss to Cambridgeshire at Fenner’s where his match figures of 14 for 189 were to remain the best of his Bucks career. He was helped on his way by Tim Russell whose six stumpings in the match included five off his bowing. Though Walter Franklin stumped five batsmen in a match on three different occasions, only once has Russell’s performance been exceeded for Bucks, by Ben Barnett against Norfolk in1954. For the next ten summers, with a brief respite when he had a single season with Norfolk, Andy Clarke became an integral member of the Bucks side, as popular in the bar after the match as in the heat of battle. Captains have praised his ability to give them a measure of control as well as the chance of running through a side in the fourth innings. Some of those who played with him have said that he was not a big spinner of the ball, but Tim Russell has no doubts about the difficulties of keeping to him: “He had a large variety of balls pace wise, a stock in-dipping thing rather than a leg spinner, but he had a devilish leg spinner as well – he bowled it very slowly and it turned a lot.” Neil Burns, who will have kept most often to Clarke, sees him as an old-fashioned slow bowler of the kind who flourished between the wars, Bomber Wells being a more recent example. Astute and with bags of stamina, he was adept at exploiting slow pitches on which the run-of-the-mill minor county player who was not good enough to work him around would get bogged down or hit out in desperation. In every season in which he played for Bucks Clarke was the leading wicket-taker. Only eight bowlers have exceeded his 284 wickets for the county, but so much reliance was placed upon him that no-one in post-war years has conceded more runs. In March 1995, the year following his triumphant display at Fenner’s, Tim Russell was awaiting the new season with keen anticipation when the telephone rang. It was his friend Tim Scriven: “Tim, I know that you always book your holidays for the county matches. Well you needn’t bother!” Thus was the captain imparting the news of Bucks’ new signing, Neil Burns. Russell would still play a few matches – it helps to be self-employed when the captain is looking for an eleventh man on a Saturday evening – but the arrival of Burns, after spells with Essex and Somerset, was to make a bigger impact on Bucks’ cricket than a mere change of keeper. In five seasons he hit 2,684 runs at an average of 47.93, higher even than Roberts, and he was yet another in the long list of fine Bucks keepers. But what he had to offer went much further. The consummate professional, Burns had not initially warmed to what he saw as the more relaxed and leisurely notion of minor counties cricket. He had been contemplating a life in South Africa and it was there that the seed of an idea was sown in conversations with Jason Harrison, then with Middlesex. But the crucial person in 101 Switch to Eastern Division Andy Clarke