Famous Cricketers No 65 - Len Hutton

SEASON’S AVERAGES Batting and Fielding M I NO Runs HS Ave 100 50 Ct Other matches 3 5 2 123 59 41.00 - 1 3 Career 36 56 7 1563 196 31.89 2 7 20 Bowling O M R W BB Ave 5i 10m Other matches (6-ball) 7 0 45 1 1-22 45.00 - - Career (6-ball) 132.1 22 503 14 3-65 35.92 - - 1936 Fortified by his trip to the Caribbean Hutton started the season in good form with half-centuries at Lord’s against the MCC and at Hull versus Essex. He had the pleasure in the Essex match of sharing in a partnership of 247 with Maurice Leyland who went on to make 263, the highest score of his career. After this his form deteriorated somewhat as he went through a spell of 64 runs in eight innings, including nought in each innings in the Worcestershire match at Stourbridge. Yorkshire, however, never lost faith in him and he repaid their confidence in early July with an innings of 163 at Headingley against Surrey. He took part in an opening partnership of 230 with Sutcliffe and one of 191 for the third wicket with Leyland “whose free driving contrasted sharply with the watchful defensive methods of Hutton, who batted seven hours.” The immediate result of this marathon innings was the award of his county cap at the age of just turned twenty, the youngest to be capped by Yorkshire in living memory. The county elders had no doubts about his potential, taking this early opportunity to show their confidence in him and boost his confidence at the same time. His strong defence was noted in the Sussex match at Hove when his 83 was the crucial factor in Yorkshire’s gaining of a three-figure lead on the first innings. Two more matches that season are of particular interest in his career development, one of failure and one of success and a glimpse of what could have been. Harold Larwood’s Benefit at Trent Bridge gave the 20 year old first-hand experience of facing great fast bowling and a realisation of what he had to master if he were going to be the great batsman the cricketing world was anticipating. Larwood and Voce, the most feared opening attack in the world, dismissed him cheaply in each innings, Larwood in the first and Voce in the second, each time bowled. (Incidentally, it is curious that although he was building up a reputation for a very solid defence, he was bowled no fewer than nineteen times during the season.) The second match of note was the last game of the season at Scarborough when he had a wonderful all-round game in his side’s victory by an innings and 95 runs: “Hutton, however, took the leading part in his side’s success. He batted soundly during an opening partnership of 132 with Mitchell and bowled better than ever before. In one spell on Thursday, he dismissed three MCC batsmen at a cost of ten runs, and when a follow-on was enforced, 255 behind, he brought his match record to eight wickets for 77 runs. Hutton used the leg and off-break with equal effect, flighted the ball and generally worried the batsmen.” At the end of the season the Cricketer Winter Annual, usually a reliable source of knowledge, expressed reservations about his batting because of his reluctance to use the many strokes which he so obviously had, but there was much praise for his bowling - “He may well develop into a leg-break and googly bowler of the front rank” - and fielding. Included in his wickets for the season had been such eminent batsmen as John Langridge, Cyril Washbrook, Eddie Paynter, Andrew Sandham, Jim Parks, Alan Melville, Freddie Brown and twice each Errol Holmes and Hugh Bartlett. It is interesting to conjecture just how much he would have achieved as a bowler if he had not become such a great batsman; he had enjoyed a more robust physique; and he had not played in such a strong bowling side. He could now look forward to the coming season confirmed in his membership of the county side as a capped player, a season in which he would become of age in more senses than one. 11