Lives in Cricket No 37 - William Clarke

Noble Game of Cricket . By the ninth edition, published c 1823, the book was entitled Lambert’s Cricketer’s Guide , with the original title as a subsidiary. Lambert certainly explains the art of slow bowling in some detail, so perhaps Clarke obtained a copy of the book, but the first time Clarke batted against Lambert, for Nottingham v England in 1817, Lambert bowled him for a single and the following year, in a similarly titled game, Lambert caught Clarke out. Richard Daft described Clarke’s bowling: Clarke’s delivery was a peculiar one. He came up to the crease with the usual trot which normally all slow under-hand bowlers adopt, but instead of delivering the ball from the height of the hip, he at the last moment bent back his elbow, bringing the ball almost under his right arm pit and delivered the ball thus from as great a height as it was possible to attain and still be under-hand. He was by this delivery able to make the ball get up higher than he would have done if he had delivered in the same way as other lob bowlers. I have often heard old cricketers say that they have received many balls from Clarke which got up quite nasty from the field with a lot of screw on them. He seldom bowled two balls alike and could vary his pace and pitch in a wonderful manner. William Caffyn, who joined the All-England Eleven towards the end of Clarke’s career, reinforces Daft’s remarks: It has been suggested that Clarke owed a great deal of his success to the fact of his appearing in public late in life, at the time when round-arm bowling had become the fashion and nearly all the great batsmen who had figured against under-hand had retired. There may be something in this, but it does not at all detract from the merit of Clarke as a bowler, for we find him, even at the close of his career, getting out regularly good batsmen who had opposed him on many occasions, and who must have become used to all his peculiarities. With regard to his batting and fielding, Haygarth in Scores and Biographies makes no mention of the latter, but states: ‘As a batsman he made some good scores in excellent style, hitting freely and well, though his average will not be found high, but he was often “not out”.’ Sutton in Nottingham Cricket Matches from 1771 to 1853 comments: ‘As a batsman, he [Clarke] is far from being inferior, but does not rank in the first-class.’ Like Haygarth, Sutton does not mention Clarke’s fielding abilities. In view of the strict diets that are inflicted on today’s professional cricketers, a note on Clarke’s match diet is given in Ashley-Cooper’s essay: He used to take for his lunch when playing cricket a cigar and a bottle of soda-water, which he declared were most satisfying with no after- effects of indigestion. His evening meal did not favour so Spartan a plan, for he enjoyed nothing more than a Michaelmas goose. When one was obtainable he would dine alone, and the sitting would be prolonged until little more than the bare bones of the bird remained. 23 Clarke as a Bowler