Famous Cricketers No 84 - G.L.Jessop

GILBERT LAIRD JESSOP The life and career of G.L.Jessop has been extensively and entertainingly set out in Gerald Brodribb’s excellent biography, The Croucher . Gilbert Laird Jessop was born on 19th May 1874 at 30 Cambray, Cheltenham, the eleventh child of Dr. Henry Edward Jessop, physician and surgeon, and of his wife Susannah Radford Jessop. The twelfth, and last child, Osman Walter Temple, was born on 3 rd January 1878. Gilbert Jessop learnt his cricket in and around the family home with improvised equipment. Aged eleven, he went to Cheltenham Grammar School, where his father had been a Governor since 1881. Jessop soon made it into the cricket team. His play was characterised by speed, whether he was bowling or batting. This attribute came quite naturally to him and he did not think it worthy of comment. He was, in later life, reticent in talking about his playing abilities but was quick to praise others. He was, in fact, a brilliant middle order right-hand batsman, a right arm fast bowler and an excellent deep fielder. He played for Gloucestershire from 1894 until 1914 and was captain from 1900 till 1912. He played for Cambridge University from 1896 to 1899, achieving a blue in all four years and captaining the side in his last year. He toured in America in 1897/98 and 1899/00 and was on A.C.MacLaren’s tour to Australia in 1901/02. He played 18 times for England between 1899 and 1912. Jessop is known, these days, primarily as a batsman, but he viewed himself, up to 1901, as a bowler who could bat. His best bowling figures were achieved when he bowled flat out. In later years, bowling success depended on being able to summon up sufficient speed when delivering the ball. He should really be viewed as an all rounder. He twice achieved a hundred wickets in a season but passed a thousand runs in these and twelve other seasons. Against virtually every County and against India, South Africa and the Philadelphians, he scored more runs with the bat than he conceded while bowling and took more wickets than the number of times he was dismissed. To this should be added his catches, a remarkable number for a deep fielder, his unknown tally of run outs and the runs he saved in the field by his ability and reputation. Gilbert Jessop was one of the most popular and entertaining batsmen of his day. Time and again, newspaper reports of matches comment on the buzz of anticipation which ran round the ground when he came out to bat and the rapturous applause he received as he went back to the pavilion after a display of hitting. Only the crowds at Taunton seem to have begrudged him his ability. His hitting appeared to have no connection with the state of the match. He would hit out just as fiercely in a situation where his team had no hope of winning as he would when they were chasing an achievable target. On occasions, he would bring an impossible total within grasp. Over and over again, he figured in the main stand of the innings, coming in after a poor start and watching his side collapse after he was out. During his career, he was likened to other big hitters, C.I.Thornton, P.S.McDonnell, G.J.Bonnor, H.H.Massie and J.J.Lyons. Between them they scored 29 centuries in 747 matches. Jessop scored 53 in 493 matches. P.G.H.Fender made 21 centuries in 556 matches, A.W.Wellard scored two hundreds and C.I.J.Smith made one. C.Milburn scored 23 centuries in 255 matches, A.W.Greig 26 in 350 and I.T.Botham 38 in 402. Jessop has the best centuries-to-matches ratio of these players. E.R.Dexter’s is slightly better. Centuries these days are measured in balls received. In Victorian and Edwardian times they were recorded, if at all, in minutes. This makes comparisons difficult across time. For most of Jessop’s career, the ball had to be hit out of the ground to record six runs. During the 1900s, it became the custom for individual grounds to allow a six for a clean hit over the boundary. From 1910 onwards, six runs were scored for a clean hit over any boundary. Had this rule been in 3