Lives in Cricket No 3 - George Duckworth

cycle and muse over the image of the brash young Prince Hal trying on the crown of the soberer figure of Henry IV, once strong but now failing a trifle. Arthur Duckworth was not the only cricketer in the family. Tommy Wright, his mother’s brother, was a chief run-scorer. Both had been recruited from their works side, Rylands Cricket Club, where Tommy Wright was a labourer. His prodigious sixes, sailing high into the nearby Garton’s factory, made him very popular. Would-be customers would check to ensure he was not out before parting with their hard-earned pennies. It seems, too, that there were those few who were permitted broken time expenses, compensation for any working hours lost through the calls of club cricket. Both Arthur Duckworth and Tommy Wright were offered trials with Lancashire, but the former, with his large family, regarded it as a dubious economic option, while the latter, a bachelor, eager to give it a go, lost two fingers in an accident with a wire coiling machine two days before his trial. Tommy Wright had to fall back on umpiring and coaching. George’s brother, Jimmy, perhaps by way of justification for wearing that special colours belt, was later to become a fine opening bat, slip fielder and occasional wicket-keeper for the club. So George Duckworth was well versed in the lore of Warrington cricket, obtaining free entry to the ground from an early age, by dint of carrying his father’s bag. He was, however, twenty before first watching Lancashire. It was a chastening experience, for Warwick Armstrong’s 1921 Australians reduced the county to a miserable 90 all out. Did it occur to George Duckworth that he would, in two summers’ time, be keeping wicket to Lancashire’s main tormentor on that occasion, Ted McDonald? Certainly he was enthused by this visit and it probably played a part in concentrating his mind on prospects of a sporting career. Frank Roberts, who became a Warrington professional in 1921, was one of the first to profit from George Duckworth’s mix of zeal and acumen. ‘My own total of wickets was swelled by his clever work behind the stumps’, he recorded, and, in that summer, George Duckworth stumped 16 and caught 22, the sort of record that was gaining him notice in significant circles. ‘He was always looking for victims,’ said Frank Roberts, summarising the Duckworth code in a phrase, ‘and his appeal could always be heard’. 14 The Background