Lives in Cricket No 19 - Frank Sugg

Chapter Three Sporting Beginnings Frank Sugg may have enjoyed many sports but cricket was undoubtedly his first love. If the early-morning knockabouts in Pitsmoor Woods demonstrated Frank’s enthusiasm for cricket, his first venture into a more competitive form of the game was evidence of the entrepreneurial and organisational talents that were to be fully revealed in his adult life. With a number of his young friends, Frank formed the Clinton Cricket Club. As the youngsters had virtually no equipment and kit, they went from house to house begging for old clothes and rags which they then sold on to a second-hand dealer. They raised 35 shillings (£1.75), sufficient to purchase stumps, bats and balls. 20 Frank could hardly have thought, as he went the rounds, that he would one day be the proprietor of a sizeable business manufacturing and retailing sports equipment. According to Frank, Clinton were not beaten for two years. No records of their games have been unearthed but we can guess that Frank would have been an important member of the side. Clinton were not the only junior side that Frank played for in his youth. He was also a member of the Pitsmoor Chorist Church Club which, tongue firmly in cheek, he referred to as ‘one of the foremost clubs they ever had in Sheffield.’ He added: ‘The club was a champion amongst youngsters though it was a Bible class affair and it brought me before the public.’ 21 It may seem strange to today’s cricket followers that a decent cricket team could be put out by a Bible class. But in nineteenth-century England, religion played a much bigger part in the lives of the population than it does today with church or chapel-going a part of the weekly routine for the large majority of families. With the population enjoying rising standards of living and increased leisure time, religious bodies saw a need for – and advantages to them – of facilities for organised sport such as cricket. In towns and villages around the 21 20 Sporting Chronicle , 25 July 1916. 21 Interview in the Athletic Journal , 2 August 1887.