Lives in Cricket No 15 - Michael Falcon

1909 Michael Falcon continued to live in Fitzwilliam Street in his second year at Pembroke and fulfilled his academic commitments before starting his cricket season, achieving a third-class mark in the Law Tripos Part I. The University played fewer first-class matches than in the previous season; Falcon played in six out of the seven and continued to impress with the bat. The highlight of his season was his first contest in a first-class fixture against a touring side, the 1909 Australians. The tourists thoroughly dominated the match; the University, having to follow on, were saved from defeat by inclement weather. Few of the Cambridge batsmen did anything but Falcon was an exception, top-scoring in the first innings with 46. The Times , not always a fan of Michael Falcon’s batting in his early days, noted some excellent leg-side strokes and some ‘dogged’ resistance while the Daily Telegraph described his innings as ‘well-judged’. Statistically, Falcon’s best performance of the University season was his innings of 130 against Sussex, but he was lucky in that he was dropped three times. Also noteworthy was a partnership of 51 with John Ireland in the Varsity match, which the Daily Telegraph described as a ‘delightful exhibition of batting’ and which allowed Cambridge to hold out for a draw. For the second year running, Michael Falcon averaged over 30 and was placed second in the Cambridge batting lists. For some reason, lost now in the mists of time, Falcon did not turn out at all for Norfolk in 1909, and he was also conspicuous by his absence from an otherwise well-attended meeting held at the end of the cricket season in order to discuss the future of Norfolk county cricket. At the start of the University season, the local press were expecting Falcon to turn out for his home county, and furthermore, they were expecting his Pembroke team-mate, Frank Mann, to play as well. (Mann was the son of Sir Edward Mann of Thelveton and thus had a residential qualification to play for Norfolk.) Whatever he was doing, Falcon does not seem to have been busy playing in high-quality social cricket elsewhere in the country. 20 Varsity Days