Lives in Cricket No 23 - Brief Candles

53 out for Kurunegala Youth CC against Singha SC in the Welagedara Stadium at Kurunegala in a Premier Championship match in November 2006. On the first day only 39.2 overs were possible, in which Ilangaratne’s side reached 102 for three; rain then prevented play on either of the other two scheduled days. In the CA scorecard he is listed to bat at an unlikely number 10, but wherever he was due to come in, sadly he never got the chance to do so; and for whatever reason he was not included in the Kurunegala Youth side for any of their remaining games of the season, nor subsequently. The unluckiest of them all You might have thought that those already listed as ‘never seen’ were the unluckiest cricketers of them all. But at least they are bona fide first- class cricketers, because the game in which they were due to play did at least get started. So spare a thought for those even less fortunate players who were selected to play in a first-class match, but never did so because conditions prevented the game ever starting. ‘Match abandoned without a ball bowled’ means that, in statistical terms, it was not a match at all – and so those selected are not credited with a first-class appearance. If this was the only first-class match for which they were selected, it means they were forever denied the kudos of being able to call themselves a first-class cricketer; so near, yet so far. Teams have not always been announced for abandoned matches, and so I cannot provide a full list of these unfortunates. From a trawl of Wisden , of Ray Webster’s First-class Cricket in Australia , and of some other sources, I have identified 18 of them; no doubt there are others in other countries. Here are the details of the unlucky 18, and the matches they were due to play in; very brief biographical information is given where known: l N.Morice, MCC v Yorkshire, Scarborough, 1891. There was no play on the first day of matches on the same dates in London and Nottingham, though both were able to progress on their second and third days; but play in Scarborough was ruled out altogether. Norman Morice was an Old Malvernian – he captained the school’s side in 1882 – who generally opened the batting, as well as taking a few wickets, in the matches recorded for him in the Cricket- Archive database. l A.J.Woodward, Warwickshire v Leicestershire, Coventry, 1908. Woodward is referred to by Robert Brooke in his book on F.R.Foster 80 as a ‘local amateur’. Simultaneous matches at nearby Worcester and Northampton were able to get started on their second days, but Coventry was unplayable throughout. l G.Parnell and A.C.Yates, New South Wales v Queensland, Sydney, 1921/22, and W.M.Forbes for Queensland in the same match. This was a friendly match from the days before Queensland were 80 Robert Brooke, F.R.Foster: The Fields Were Sudden Bare, ACS Publications, 2011. Never Seen