Lives in Cricket No 46 - George Raikes

99 but he has the knack of inspiring the same qualities in others, and by his tact and bonhomie he seems to be able to make every player who comes into the team feel thoroughly at home when playing for the county, and feel, moreover, that the cause of the county is his own, and play for it with the same ungrudging energy with which a public schoolboy plays for his school. And the moral of that is this, that in looking for a captain for a cricket team or for any other undertaking, while you want the skill, the experience, and the judgement, the one thing that you must have is the heart, or character, or temperament, or whatever you like to call it, which can inspire in others the enthusiasm the captain himself has. “Now to come to individual performances. The most successful batsman in this, as in many other seasons, has been [Raikes], who headed the Norfolk averages so long ago as 1893. There are no doubt many qualities which have contributed to this success, but one cannot help thinking that the chief reason for it is the old-fashioned correctness of his style, and especially of his defence. No one has ever seen Mr Raikes getting in front of his wicket and facing the bowler to play straight balls, and the guiding principle of his batting would seem to be the keeping of the left shoulder forward. This position enables him to begin to drive the over-pitched ball, even from the fastest bowlers, directly he goes in with confidence and without risk. That it is consistent with the closest watching of the ball no one who saw his innings against Notts 2 nd at Norwich could ever question. There is, of course, very much more than this to admire in his batting, but perhaps this is the thing most useful to imitate.” (note 6) To put statistics to the ‘impressions’, Raikes played 11 innings, scoring 679 runs at 61.73, and bowled 182.2 overs, taking 57 wickets at 10.66. He scored three centuries, in consecutive matches, and took five five-wicket hauls. He graced every match with a highly significant performance: v Suffolk: nine for 24 v Bedfordshire: 142 and six for 37 v Nottinghamshire second XI: 125 and seven for 46 v Nottinghamshire second XI: 133 and three for 27 v Cambridgeshire: 83 and six for 70 v Bedfordshire: five for 55 v Cambridgeshire: 63 and four for 47, and three for 17 v Berkshire: four for 50, and three for 32 It would be unfair to suggest that Raikes ‘carried’ Norfolk to the title for Stevens scored 679 runs and Birkbeck 398 whilst, among the bowlers, Gibson took 49 wickets, Allsopp 47 and Falcon 35. However, his inspirational captaincy (as described above), would have undoubtedly helped him to get the best of his ‘support’ players. The Association of Cricket Statisticians, in its publications on early seasons in the Minor Counties Championship, attempts to quantify an all-rounder’s effectiveness by awarding them one point for each run scored and six points for each wicket taken (see page 146 of the Handbook for 1910). The leading all-rounder of 1910 was, of course, Raikes; in addition to being the Raikes’ Third Spell For Norfolk: The Championship Won Again