Lives in Cricket No 17 - Fuller Pilch

innings but there was no time for Kent to make a start on chasing the 100-run target. The Young v Old match at Lord’s on 28, 29 and 30 July was played for the benefit of John Bayley, a practice bowler for MCC since 1823: Fuller with his ‘Old’ companions won by seven wickets. Two matches for Kent came next. They lost to Sussex by 62 runs at Tunbridge Wells at the beginning of August and then went on to lose to England in Canterbury Week by four wickets on 11, 12 and 13 August, with Fuller making three scores in the twenties in these games. There were no more Kent matches arranged that summer, so two days after Canterbury Cricket Week ended, Fuller went to Dorset to link up with the Clarke squad for eleven consecutive games between August 18 and September 24, travelling throughout England and Scotland to play odds matches, many of them of two or three days duration against Twenty-Twos, in places as widely separated as Sherborne, Worcester, Stoke-on-Trent, Ilkeston, Sheffield, Huddersfield, Bradford, Newburgh Park (near Aberdeen), Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Birmingham. It is said that at Glasgow, he cut he pitch himself, with a scythe, shortly before the match started. Clarke then took his players off to Devon, Hampshire and Sussex without Fuller who returned to Norfolk to end his season with one of the most extraordinary innings of his career. The game took place over three days in October, the actual dates were not recorded, at Mr Springell’s Field at King’s Lynn in Norfolk, where his brother William had moved to take over as innkeeper of the Royal Oak. It featured the Lynn Club against Twenty-Two of Lynn who were strengthened by the inclusion of Fuller Pilch in their crowded ranks. Lynn Club made 96 in their first innings with Fuller, even at his age, showing everyone how to bowl by taking six wickets. The Twenty-Two managed to score 39, with only one batsman reaching double figures, and no, it was not Fuller; his contribution was nought! The Club managed 43 in their second innings, with Fuller taking another five wickets, and the Twenty-Two needed 101 to win. Once more only one batsman reached double figures, and this time it was Fuller. But what double figures they were! An unbeaten 70 runs to take his team through to a two-wicket victory. The All-England Eleven began the 1852 season in Scotland on 10 May without Fuller and he did not play in their first five matches. His season began on 28 May at Canterbury in a one-day match for the Canterbury Club against the Manchester Club, who three days earlier had played MCC at Lord’s, and were allowed John Wisden as a given man. Three days later Fuller joined Clarke’s All-England Eleven at Lord’s to play a combined Surrey and Sussex Eleven who won by 51 runs. Then the All-England Eleven, including Fuller, moved to the Kennington Oval to play Surrey on 3, 4 and 5 June. Fuller’s contributions in these games were modest, two runs in four innings. In the second match Clarke switched sides to play for Surrey with Parr and Bickley, underscoring the unsatisfactory nature of the team Fuller’s final seasons 110