Lives in Cricket No 25 - Tom Richardson

75 XI against The Rest he took out MacLaren, Grace and Jessop, and for a Surrey and Sussex XI against The Rest in his eight for 52, his victims were MacLaren, Grace, Storer, Jessop, Board, Hirst, Briggs and Rhodes. He finished 22 nd in the first-class averages 180 and despite his relatively modest season, his total of 161 wickets was second only to J.T.Hearne’s 222. Cricket summed up Surrey’s season. At the beginning of the year it was feared that Surrey would be terribly weak in bowling, for Richardson, after a few successes on difficult wickets, lost his pace and was no longer the Richardson of last year. There seemed no one to take his place, for he had been head and shoulders above the other bowlers. Happily Lockwood again came into the team, and from first to last bowled in splendid form, and as Richardson occasionally came out with a good analysis, it was seldom that the attack was found wanting. 181 Wisden , while commenting on Lockwood’s ‘restoration’, drew the inevitable statistical comparison between Richardson’s statistics and those of the previous season. Lockwood, whose career in first-class cricket had seemed to be over, came back to almost his finest form with the ball, but as a set-off against his restoration – no milder word will express the change that came over him – Richardson, and in a still more marked degree, Hayward fell a long way below the standard reached in the previous year. Richardson, it is true, wound up the season uncommonly well – bowling in irresistible fashion against Warwickshire at the Oval on the first days of September – but taking the whole summer through he was only the shadow of himself. In such a case as this figures can safely be trusted. In 1897 Richardson took, in county matches alone, 238 wickets, with an average of 14.55, whereas last season, playing in two matches less, he only took 126 wickets, with an average of something over 21. The difference of course was enormous. Having regard to the form in which he ended his season’s labours, there is no reason to suppose that Richardson has permanently gone off. The more likely explanation is that he felt the effects of his hard work, during the winter, with Mr Stoddart’s team in Australia. Fast bowlers cannot, with impunity, play cricket all the year round, and it would have been better for Surrey, as well as for his own reputation, if Richardson had not paid a second visit to the Colonies. 182 180 of those taking ten wickets or more 181 Cricket 8 September 1898 182 Wisden 1899 p 60 Fin-de-Siècle Cartoon of Tom Richardson in rare batting mode. [Harmsworth Magazine: Volume 1, 1898/99]