Lives in Cricket No 36 - WE Astill

79 who were ‘on the platform to renew acquaintance with old friends’. Then Astill swiftly got to work, ‘varying his flight cleverly’ in dismissing five of the visitors in their first innings and four in their second to end with match figures of nine for 109 in a low-scoring encounter which Leicestershire seemed likely to lose until a dogged 24 (top score) from Astill and an unexpected last-wicket partnership by Geary and Skelding enabled them to escape. Their first victory, at Leyton in their second Championship match, owed much to Astill, who took nine wickets (as did Geary) and then, when Leicestershire stuttered to 17 for three in pursuit of 137 after ten wickets had fallen for a mere 68 runs on the third morning, scored a ‘brilliant’ unbeaten 75 in partnership with King ‘so unexpectedly decisive … that it will rank among the big things of Leicestershire cricket’, as the local paper’s reporter gushed. A few days later Astill and Geary were selected for the Test Trial at Trent Bridge. They warmed up substantially against Hampshire, with seven and six wickets respectively and a second- innings partnership of 98 in 75 minutes, both scoring half-centuries, to bring about a victory that had looked unlikely at 30 for three: What reason had anyone to pre-suppose that Astill and Geary would proceed to put on nearly a hundred runs as freely and cool[l]y as if they were engaged in a practice match? That is what happened. It is a long time since Aylestone Road saw anything as audacious as this. Neither performed remarkably in the Test Trial, and neither was chosen for England until Geary was called up for the fourth match, which rain limited to 165 minutes. In the first innings Astill, according to his local newspaper, did ‘bowl an exceptional length with some break’, had Sutcliffe caught and saw Woolley dropped by the usually reliable Chapman before snaring him in the same way on the final day. Undismayed by match figures of two for 79, he promptly returned to county duty after the abandonment of the entire match with Surrey to score fifties in losses against Sussex and Lancashire (a ‘lively’ 61) and then dismissed five Gloucestershire men to limit their lead to 98 and keep his side in the game. Had he not injured his ankle after bowling only three overs for a single wicket in the visitors’ second innings, supporters at Aylestone Road would probably have been saved many a cardiac palpitation as they watched their team squeeze out victory by a single run. Astill’s reappearance two weeks later happily coincided with Geary’s benefit match against Warwickshire, to which his contributions were first a hard-hit 88, when he came in at No.6 because of uncertainty over the strength of his ankle, and then four good wickets to enforce the follow-on before he left Shipman and the beneficiary to complete a most satisfying victory. Four more half-centuries were to follow: at Birmingham in the very next match, although ‘for the most part the ball beat the bat’ ( Wisden ), Astill, now restored to the position of first wicket down, lightened the gloom with 61 in under an hour, by far the highest score of the rain-spoiled encounter; in the Bank Holiday fixture at Northampton he overshadowed his partners in scoring 57; against Yorkshire he made a quick 65, putting on a hundred with Sharp when his side looked like losing by an innings; and in the final Championship game of the season, when ‘the weather The First ‘Doubles’