Lives in Cricket No 25 - Tom Richardson

105 Apart from a correction to the address, the entry remains the same for the following year, but by 1896, the angle has changed slightly: ... took 237 wickets for Surrey last season and 290 in all first-class matches: can bat well and is a good field. 247 The Sporting Life was more honest and more critical: Perhaps Richardson should be described as a fast bowler rather than a thorough cricketer – although no one ever put his heart and soul into a game to a greater extent, but while he stopped and caught most things that came to him at mid-off where he generally fielded he was not a good field; and although he more than once made a useful score, his batting was unorthodox in the extreme. Yet he had a good eye, and was always a delight to the Oval crowd with his hitting that carried the ball very high – when he happened to hit it. 248 Herbert Strudwick attributes to Richardson the unusual characteristic of being able to recollect statistical detail of matches in which he has played 247 Lillywhite’s 1894 p 244, 1895 p 233, 1896 p 288. 248 5 July 1912 Technique and Personality Balls with which Richardson took 10-45 against Essex in 1894 and 8-94 in his last Test match v Australia at the SCG in 1898. Along with the cap they were bought by David Frith from Richardson’s son, Tom, to whom his father bequeathed as heirlooms his watch and chain and personal jewellery and the cricket balls presented during his career and all his cricket mementoes. The cap was, according to Tom junior, Richardson’s England cap. They are now numbered chronologically, beginning with Tom Armitage at 1. The most recent in2012 is Samit Patel. Tom’s would have been 88, Brockwell’s 87. However it was not until after the establishment of the Board of Control in 1899 that caps were physically awarded: so it appears to be an anachronism, either awarded retrospectively and sentimentally… or it belonged to someone else. [David Frith Collection]