The Summer Field

65 odds. The Weekly Record told how Australian bookmakers had bribed two English professionals ‘to sell a match’, ‘and were only frustrated by the honourable conduct of a third man who refused to be bought and disclosed the conspiracy.’ This gave the magazine the excuse to praise England and its readers: whereas Colonial towns wanted to beat each other and bet on their interests. ‘We play for play’s sake far more than for victory: and it is only at University matches when local patriotism is interested for a few sovereigns change hands … and we may trust that the Colonial vice will never take firm root at Lord’s and the Oval.’ As the magazine showed, placing money on a match threatened the essence of cricket ‘for play’s sake’. Men felt strongly for, or against, betting. Hence cricket, and society, felt awkward about it. Of those that did not like or understand betting on sport or anything, some clergy hated it as sinful; others admitted it had a place. In the first volume of his memoirs, the former Liberal prime minister Herbert Asquith wrote of his ‘strong interest’ in horse racing and cricket, and ‘lack of the gambling temperament’. He claimed it was haphazard why some sports had gambling such as football and horse racing, and some not: ‘… such popular sports as cricket, golf and boat racing have for all practical purposes remained outside the range of money speculation.’ A run of adverts in the Somerset yearbook showed how the game frowned on bets. A sometime county committee man, Leonard Creed, in 1959-60 advertised his ‘turf and football accountant’ business in Bath with a cartoon of himself at the wicket, bat between his pads and gloves under his armpit. The wicketkeeper was saying to him, ‘Five bob he clean bowls you’. The other batsman, and umpires, were drawn with their hats spinning off their heads; the bowler dropped the ball in surprise; and a policeman ran on the field. As the caption read: ‘Well! This just isn’t cricket! Neither is it legal!’ To bet with Len Creed you had to ring in (and plenty must have, as he had ten telephone lines). By 1964/65 he could urge, ‘Have a “flutter” on Somerset to win the Championship’. What had changed was not cricket’s attitude, but English law, that allowed betting shops. All along betting kept surfacing, because vices do. Bets have an appeal, to men vain enough to believe they know cricket and can predict what will happen next, and greedy enough to seek to profit. Or, was treating the game as a gamble the only way to make sense of it – for your own peace of mind? How could you explain otherwise why you or your team failed when you felt so well set, or why you succeeded when in an unhappy mood or the day after a night’s drinking? Different views of the world collided in a story of Cyril Foley’s from May 1899. On the train to London a friend told Foley of a dream of a team all out for ten. Foley was playing for Middlesex at Lord’s against Somerset, who within 20 minutes were eight for eight. According to Foley, he only then remembered the dream: ‘I rushed up to [Andrew] Stoddart between the overs to bet him £1 which he refused that Somerset would make exactly ten.’ In fact Somerset reached 35. Middlesex made 86 (Foley making the match’s joint top score of 20) and Somerset fell to five for five. Again Foley offered to bet Stoddart a sovereign; only meanwhile Foley had told Stoddart of the dream. Stoddart Private Life