Lives in Cricket No 23 - Brief Candles

90 By the end of the first day the county had made 173 for four, and on the Monday they extended this to a final total of 396, with best scores of 83 by P.A. ‘Bill’ Wright and 71 by opener Wilfrid Timms. Wooster, at No.10, scored six – two twos and two singles – before giving a straightforward caught-and-bowled back to James Wills; in his 15-minute stay he helped to add 41 with Bill Wright. The University batted again, needing 199 to make the county bat a second time. Their innings began at 3.10 pm, and three minutes later Wooster, asked this time to open the attack, bowled Achey Kelly with his first ball of the innings. Around twenty minutes later he bowled Mark Sugden, and after five overs his figures were 5-0-17-2. And now glory beckoned. The first five balls of his sixth over comprised three dots and two boundaries, but with his sixth he had Joseph Peacocke caught by his captain, John Fitzroy, for 10. Edgar Towell bowled the next over, in which opener George McVeagh and the new batsman Charles McCausland scored three runs, and then it was Wooster’s turn again. With the first ball of his seventh over he bowled McVeagh for 17, and next ball he bowled Wills for the second time in the match. The University were now 56 for five, and Wooster’s figures had improved to 6.2-0-25-5, including a hat-trick. According to the scorebook, Wooster’s glory moment – the third wicket of his hat-trick – had come at 3.51 pm precisely. Local newspaper reports do not record what level of celebration, if any, there was of Wooster’s feat, but it certainly did not go unnoticed, as it was referred to in all match reports the following day. Whether the excitement of the achievement then got to him, or whether the batsmen just got his measure, we don’t know, but he was wicketless for his remaining 6.4 overs, in which he conceded 29 runs, including 14 in his 11th over. James Pigot, whose 49 was to be the University’s top score of the match, scored 13 runs off this over, including three fours. Wooster’s final analysis was 13- 1-54-5; the Northamptonshire scorebook indicates that this was bowled in a single spell, though the Northampton Daily Chronicle says that his rough treatment by Pigot came in ‘a second spell’. I prefer to believe the scorebook. The bowling of Bill Wright and Graham Norris, another debutant, took care of the remaining University batsmen. The side was dismissed for 143 at about 5.30 pm, leaving the county winners by an innings and 56 runs; at which point Dick Wooster walked off the first-class field for ever, no doubt In the Wickets The image has been removed due to copyright restrictions .