Famous Cricketers No 76 - J.N.Crawford

and life of Comus Bassington in British West Africa our hero at least returned briefly (1919-21) to London to play first-class cricket for Surrey and the Gentlemen. However one defines a ‘hero’ Crawford appears to have been almost an Edwardian Botham in his capacity to get on to the scoreboard and up establishment noses. He could turn games around and agreements over, antagonise the powerful, endear himself to the young and those young enough at heart to care to characterise great personal performances as ‘heroic’. Unfortunately when he returned to England he did not bring with him that boon or gift, sustained all-round ability, which could have remedied the deficiencies about to be exposed in English cricket by Warwick Armstrong’s Australian team of 1920-21. Instead Jack Crawford quit the first-class scene after a dozen matches, playing league cricket at Rochdale and club cricket around London before spending the last four decades of his life in comparative sporting obscurity. 37