Lives in Cricket No 25 - Tom Richardson

27 we saw him, his delivery was far less open to objection, and, though an occasional ball looked like a throw, we quite believe that he did his best to be strictly fair. Leaving the dispute as to his delivery aside, he clearly proved himself an extraordinary bowler. 54 It was not in Richardson’s character to cheat deliberately. He was a natural, received little coaching and at this early stage of his career had not ‘honed’ his action. There is no subsequent record of suspicion though, so it must be assumed that whatever flaws existed were quickly and easily ironed out. Eleven wickets against the touring Australians followed as Surrey won in two days: Lockwood bowled creditably, but chief honours were carried by Richardson, who opened the splendid record he obtained against the Australians during the summer by taking eleven wickets for 95 runs. 55 There were a further eleven, including a hat-trick – his first of four for the county – against Gloucestershire as Surrey again triumphed with a day to spare, five in the first innings against Cambridge University (Lockwood had eight in the second), nine against Lancashire to take him through 50 for the season in less than three weeks. En route, he had distinguished himself with his batting in the Gloucestershire match. Richardson, however, proved as useful to Surrey with the bat as he had with the ball. Brockwell and he hit so freely that seventy minutes realised 105 runs, of which Richardson’s share was 69. He had one piece of luck in hitting a ball just over point’s head which Mr E.M.Grace could have caught had he not left it to Captain Luard who failed to reach it. Otherwise, he gave no chance and his all round hitting was particularly clean and well timed. 56 The partnership, beginning at 75-9, realised as many as the whole of the Gloucestershire first innings through which W.G.Grace had carried his bat for 61. Richardson never bettered his 69 and never, as a batsman, was he in more distinguished company, as Surrey’s No.11 matched Gloucestershire’s No.1 as the top scorer for his county. The partnership remains the highest for Surrey’s tenth wicket against Gloucestershire and has lasted longer than that for any other wicket. It is Richardson’s only appearance in the Surrey record books for his batting, compared with several dozen for his bowling. The innings seems to have warmed him up for a spell of 18.4-6-33-6 in the second innings: Richardson’s bowling was again accountable for the failure of the Gloucestershire batsmen. This time he was even more successful and on Friday morning his analysis showed 39 balls for seven runs and 54 p 81 55 p 183 56 Cricket 8 June 1893 1892-94 Surrey...and England