Lives in Cricket No 1 - Allan Watkins

As an uncapped player, Allan returned to a wage of no more than four pounds a week. “I used to go to Usk and look at the roadmen sweeping the roads, and in the back of my mind I used to think to myself, ‘Well why have I got all this worry about cricket and form when I could be doing that for more or less the same money?’” Despite their slender resources Glamorgan had begun their season well with three wins and two losses in the seven matches before Allan joined the team, and by the end of the summer, at the age of 48, Clay would have taken 130 wickets at 13.40 and led his side to sixth place in the Championship. Like his good friend Turnbull before him, the Winchester-educated Clay, with his racehorses and a fine home at Cowbridge, came from a different world from Allan. Though holding a regular place in the side, Allan, usually batting at seven, found runs elusive in a wet summer that often saw the bowlers take command, but 14 in his first innings of the season was the top score in a Glamorgan total of 50 against Essex. ‘The way he set his teeth and stuck there at a very awkward time was an object lesson,’ wrote former Glamorgan cricketer E.R.K.Glover in the Western Mail. There were 100 minutes of defiance in a top-scoring 44 not out against Middlesex at Swansea, but this was followed by three ducks in a row, and after 15 completed innings Allan had garnered just 167 runs. Moreover, the young man who had started his county career by taking the new ball was asked to bowl only eight overs all summer. Only Allan’s fielding was contributing much to the side’s success. This was the year in which he first took his place in the leg trap, holding 18 catches in his 16 matches. Allan had begun his career as an out-fielder, and he was not one of the best: “I wasn’t too quick in the outfield, being a small chap. And I dropped a few catches. Then one day we were playing at Pontypridd. Austin Matthews was bowling and a few balls went down the leg side as catches, and he said, ‘I’d like to have a fielder there.’ So I was called in to short leg, and I caught one or two. So I was told, ‘That’s your position now.’” It was Arnold Dyson who was always ready with a useful tip for the new close catcher. “I remember taking a catch one day and I’d gone a long way left. I was on the floor with the ball in my left hand and Arnold was at forward short leg. And all he said was: ‘How many times have I got to tell thee? Don’t anticipate.’” A Foothold in County Cricket 27