Lives in Cricket No 17 - Fuller Pilch

A week later Sussex went up to Lord’s to play an MCC side strengthened by Fuller, Wenman and Redgate and proved that they were still a force to be reckoned with, winning by three wickets. Fuller top-scored in the first MCC innings with 30 out of 82 and might have done even better in the second if he had not been run out on 13. Kent went down to Brighton to face Sussex in the last week of June and won by three wickets, thanks to Fuller’s unbeaten 69 in the second innings chasing 152. Then came the traditional Gentlemen v Players fixture on 3 and 4 July where MCC repeated the idea of making the Players defend a larger wicket, this time with four stumps 36 inches by 12 inches while the Gentlemen defended three stumps according to the latest Laws, 27 inches by 8 inches. It was called the ‘Barn-Door Match’ and the difference in the size of wickets had no effect as the Players won by an innings in a low-scoring match where Fuller was out for nine when dismissed by Sir Frederick Hervey-Bathurst, fast bowler and baronet, ‘hat knocked on wicket’. But the most important match that summer was the North against the South challenge in mid-July at Lord’s to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of MCC. The game had been announced the year before by Benjamin Aislabie, the MCC secretary, and noted in the club minutes, as follows: The Marylebone Club having been established in the year 1787, it is resolved that a Jubilee Match shall take place at Lord’s Ground on the second Monday in July 1837, for the benefit of the players; twenty-two of whom shall be chosen to perform on that day. The Earl of Thanet and the Lord Frederick Beauclerk are requested to make the selection: and every Member of the Club is solicited for a subscription of One Pound towards the promotion of the sport on this interesting occasion. This time Fuller was chosen to play for the South and made 13 out of their first innings total of 60 before being dismissed by Redgate. He was held back in the second innings but the South reached the 70 runs target after losing only five wickets. Three thousand spectators attended on both days, including a ‘long list of fashionables’. After the match, all the players were guests at a Jubilee dinner ‘served up in Mr Dark’s usual excellent style and consisted of every delicacy of the season’ according to Bell’s Life . Eleven players from the Jubilee match, five from the North and six from the South, returned to Lord’s a week later to face ‘Sixteen Gentlemen’. Haygarth said some of these had been selected only because they ‘happened to be on the ground.’ It was no surprise that the Players, with a score of 154 including 34 from Fuller, won by an innings and 38 runs with Lillywhite taking eighteen wickets. Nottinghamshire had arrived in the south of England to play Sussex at Brighton on 24, 25 and 26 July, and then on the following two days met Kent for the first time, losing at Town Malling by nine wickets. Fuller was lbw for five runs in his only innings, the bowler unidentified but possibly Redgate. Two weeks later Fuller was in Surrey to record the highest score of his career, 160 for Town Malling against Reigate. Scores and Biographies Kent become the greatest team in England 57