Lives in Cricket No 19 - Frank Sugg

Wanderers, Burnley, Derby County, Everton, Notts County, Preston North End, Stoke City, West Bromwich Albion, and Wolverhampton Wanderers. Note the absence of any club from the south. The impetus for the formation of the League was the spread of professionalism in the sport though this was not finally recognised by the Football Association until 1885; before then players could play for any number of clubs so long as they were paid-up members. Of the Sheffield clubs, Sheffield Wednesday became professional in 1887 and entered the Football League when it was extended in 1891. Sheffield United, established in 1889 with their ground at Bramall Lane, also joined the Football League in 1891. Sheffield Football Club has remained an amateur club up to the present day. This was the background to Frank Sugg’s career in football. As a youth he joined in makeshift football games with his pals in the fields and lanes of Pitsmoor. They were of course much easier to set up than the cricket that they played in the summer. Frank’s strength and commitment in these games marked him out from his peers and, as with his cricket, he was soon chosen for local club sides where he established himself as a brave ‘no nonsense’ type of player whether at centre-half, his favourite position, or at centre-forward. He could not be described as a ball player in any football sense of the term. Of course, football was a more physical and less skilful game than it is today, and that suited Frank Sugg’s style of play. His ability was soon recognised by the Sheffield Football Association and he was selected for Sheffield in matches against London and Glasgow. With this recognition, Frank could expect leading football clubs of the day to be interested in making use of his services. According to the biographical details of Frank Sugg in the cricket literature, he played for a number of major football clubs and was captain of several of them. For example, Anthony Woodhouse, the Yorkshire cricket historian, said in his Who’s Who of Yorkshire County Cricket Club : ‘He was also a first-rate footballer, captaining Sheffield Wednesday, Derby County and Burnley, as well as assisting Bolton Wanderers, Everton and West Manchester.’ 41 From the other side of the Pennines, Brian Bearshaw in his From the Stretford End: the Official History of Lancashire County Cricket Club stated that Sugg ‘had football fame with Sheffield Frank Sugg the Footballer 43 41 Anthony Woodhouse, Who’s Who of Yorkshire County Cricket Club , Breeden Books, 1992, p 190.