Lives in Cricket No 29 - AN Hornby

77 difficult Manchester wicket and took eight Kent wickets a few days later, four of his last six wickets coming in the second innings without a run being scored off his bowling. One of Crossland’s victims was Kent skipper Lord Harris, who had been Hornby’s captain on the 1878/79 tour to Australia. That relationship between Hornby and Harris made little difference and the good lord was to orchestrate the attacks on Crossland’s action. It was a fact that Crossland was never no-balled in his entire career by a first-class umpire – a point vigorously made by Hornby, who was not shy in coming to his star bowler’s defence. The right-armer was born in the village of Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, often dubbed ‘the nursery of cricket’ and which was the birthplace of so many famous cricketers including Johnny Briggs, Fred Morley, James Shaw and, more recently, Tim Robinson. At times Crossland was almost unplayable and looked a certainty The Crossland and Mold throwing controversies Umpire Bob Thoms. In a famous exchange about throwing, Lord Harris snapped: ‘When are you umpires going to do something about this?’ Thoms, who had controversially given Australia’s Sammy Jones run out in the Oval Test the previous year, replied: ‘My Lord, we are going to do nothing. It is you gentlemen who have got to do it.’