The Summer Field

50 Nottingham Journal in May 1926, before the England-Australia Tests, was not convinced that Hendren and Sandham, ‘good as they undoubtedly are on other occasions, possess what is known as Test match temperament’. Faulkner defined it in June 1926 during the Test trial before the first Test at Trent Bridge: ‘It is guts that is required to beat the Australians – a fact the selectors will undoubtedly not lose sight of.’ How did you define ‘guts’? Like grace, it was something you knew when you saw it, not something you could describe. Faulkner praised the not quite 21-year-old Duleepsinhji as: the one batsman who shaped like a big cricketer; he was obviously nervous and unsteadied by the batting that had gone before but he nonetheless put the bat to the ball and scored fours where others had scored singles. If ever there was an England cricketer in the making it is this young nephew of the famous Ranji … Duleep possesses the supreme knack of making the ball always appear as if it could do little else than come obediently to his bat. Faulkner was covering much ground here: mastery of the occasion – inside yourself and in comparison with others; pedigree, whether through family, locality, or coach (an admiration for someone’s background could turn into favouritism?); and something else hard to define, a ‘knack’, an ability, ‘magic’, even, if it looked too hard to explain. As it happened the selectors chose Patsy Hendren – and the 35-year-old Jack Hearne, in his last Test match – but not Andy Sandham or Duleep. Not that selectors explained themselves any better. At a dinner for the Australian tourists at Leicester in May 1926, Pelham Warner spoke of how ‘you must have people with determination and grit’. What was the difference between ‘grit’ and ‘guts’?! Perhaps simply by lasting as a pro’ cricketer, gaining experience and becoming gradually more senior as others retired, you showed you had the right qualities. Or as a tribute to Maurice Hallam on becoming the county captain put it in the 1963 Leicestershire yearbook: ‘Like most young professionals he had a long struggle to make the grade.’ Ability might need time to show itself; after Hallam’s county debut in 1950, the batsman did not make a first-class century for 182 innings, until June 1956 (admittedly he did two years’ national service). Put another way, merely having the ability did not mean you would succeed. In a July 1936 article J.W.Hearne admitted: ‘I didn’t think it was ever intended that I should take up the game as a profession. I had actually made a start on the learning of my future business before my uncle [J.T.Hearne] took me along to Lord’s and got me a job on the ground staff.’ Denis Compton should have had fewest doubts about his fate, once Pelham Warner offered him a place on the Lord’s ground staff as he recalled in the Middlesex review of 1983-4: Mum had other ideas. Cricket was a four-months-a-year job, she insisted, and what would I do for the remaining eight months? No, I was going to try to find a job in the town hall, working as a civil servant. All was resolved, though, when Arsenal offered me a place after one of their scouts saw me play for England against Wales schoolboys. I now had employment throughout the year. Who Was A Cricketer?