Lives in Cricket No 3 - George Duckworth

Duckworth was capable of some stubborn resistance as a batsman but he was no bits and pieces wicket-keeper, depended upon for lots of middle order runs. There was little need for these, given the pre-eminence of the higher grade of Lancashire’s batting. Although, like other mortal men, George Duckworth had his highs and lows, his shoal of fishes and his empty nets, it is his consistency that is the more remarkable. The biography of an Archie MacLaren or a Johnny Briggs might be replete with stunning individual stand-out performances, begging for theatrical reconstruction and vivid story-telling. Conversely, it is the constancy of the wicket-keeper that, less colourfully, less boldly, is his hallmark. Day in, day out, summer after summer, George Duckworth played an average of thirty or so first-class matches, 30 The Cricket The routine of wicket-keeping: Duckworth at the stumps in 1929