Lives in Cricet No 33 - Jack Robertson and Syd Brown

44 Sussex made 153, a total which Syd’s side had almost passed when he was caught in the deep for 105 made in two hours. Later in the year Jack played two more ‘representative’ matches for an England XI which beat the RAAF on the 7 August and drew with The Dominions the next day. In both matches he got in, and then got out. In the first he made 15, but like other batsmen in the match he was overshadowed by Walter Hammond (105) and Keith Miller (85), both of whom batted in typically dominating form and scored nearly half their side’s runs. The next day Jack opened with Nottinghamshire’s Reg Simpson, a stylish batsman who had already made a good impression in wartime cricket. Only 19 when war was declared, he had not yet made his first-class debut but would do so with some success the following winter in India where he would play with, among others, future county colleague Joe Hardstaff and Denis Compton. After the war Simpson would be one of Jack’s rivals for a place in the England team. Jack was the more enterprising of the pair, making all but one of the first 24 runs before he was taken at the wicket by Sismey off the persevering medium pace of New Zealand Test player Ted Badcock. The match for which many remembered Jack was played on 29 July at Lord’s between two strong sides representing the Army and the RAF. Rain delayed the start until 2 o’clock. After an incident-free hour the Army had reached 57 for the loss of Jack’s partner, Yorkshire’s Harry Halliday, when an ominous buzzing sound was heard from the south. It was a V1 flying bomb, more colloquially a buzz-bomb or doodlebug. The enemy Doodlebug Summer ‘Sign please, Mister.’ Jack and Syd, together with Denis and Les Compton, at Lord’s, probably in 1941.