Lives in Cricket No 42 - Frank and George Mann

18 Chapter Four Frank Mann and Middlesex: 1912 to 1914 Although it had been agreed that Frank would be available to join Middlesex for the summer of 1912, the demands of the first year of his apprenticeship at Styles and Winch at Maidstone meant that he had to miss the first eight weeks of the season before he could join Warner and the team at Southampton on 27 June. Only 15 runs from his two innings against Hampshire indicated that he was missing match practice. The next game was against the South African tourists at Lord’s in their preparation for the Triangular Tournament, a series of Test matches in competition with England and Australia, and it appeared that he was back on track when the second day was ended by rain, with Frank unbeaten on 38 and looking full of runs against the bowling of Pegler and Faulkner, only to be frustrated when the third day was washed out by more rain. All doubts were dispelled on the final day of the next match, not far from his workplace at Maidstone, and he was on his way to those elusive three figures when Warner declared on 377 for six, leaving Frank unbeaten on 85. A disappointment for the young man but a lesson in captaincy when Warner explained that his decision was necessary if he was going to give his bowlers time to dismiss Kent before the day ended. Warner was proved right by the result − victory for Middlesex by 270 runs. Frank was dismissed for two in his only innings against Warwickshire at Lord’s in the next match but made amends with 84 when the teams met again immediately afterwards at Birmingham, going in at 63 for four and enjoying a fifth-wicket partnership of 52 with Jack Hearne. With six more matches on tour before Middlesex returned to Lord’s for the last three matches of the season, there appeared to be plenty more occasions for Frank to shine with the bat. But in those nine matches he managed to score no more than 76 runs from twelve visits to the wicket, failing to reach double figures on nine occasions. Things didn’t improve when he was selected to play in a joint Surrey and Middlesex eleven, alongside Jack Hobbs, Tom Hayward, Frank Tarrant and both the Hearnes, against the touring Australians and was soon out for only two. Frank began the 1913 season with top score of 71 out of 222 against Sussex at Lord’s and was moved back up the batting order by Warner in the belief that he was over the end-of-season slump of the year before. But once again, the possibility that Frank would be able to develop into a big-scoring middle-order batsman was shown to be over-optimistic when he managed only 68 runs in the next six matches, reaching double figures only once. Moved to fifth or sixth wicket down, Frank immediately showed that he was back in his comfort zone when asked to go on the attack and