Lives in Cricket No 46 - George Raikes

15 The Early Life of George Barkley Raikes; Family and Schooling of those – in Shrewsbury’s second innings, his innings of 82 out of just 137 was utterly dominating. That year he also notched up half-centuries against Ludlow, Rock Ferry and Boughton Hall and a century against the Old Salopians. The Norfolk press had taken notice and salivated: “[Raikes] has been scoring heavily throughout the season, and the Norfolk captain is doubtless looking forward to the time when he will be available for County matches.” Year Inns NO Runs HS Avge Ovs Mns Runs Ws Avge SR Econ 1888 6 1 51 25 10.20 ? 1889 11 0 143 64 13.00 ? 1890 13 1 397 118* 33.08 60.1 11 157 14 11.21 21.50 52.16 1891 12 2 464 142 46.40 115.2 32 251 18 13.94 32.06 43.50 1892 13 1 514 116 42.83 88 27 181 15 12.07 29.33 41.14 Total 55 5 1569 142 31.38 263.3 70 589 47 12.53 28.04 44.69 The table below lists the schoolboy batsmen with the highest averages in the season of 1892. It is notable how few ‘trained on’. Jack Mason became a solid first-class cricketer and did go an Ashes tour, albeit without much success, but, of the rest, Mordaunt (a long jumper to Olympic standard), Smith and Raikes fell just short whilst Hemingway and Champain vanished almost without trace. At first sight, Raikes’ failure to transfer his run-scoring from school to Varsity might seem surprising but a careful rereading of The Salopian (“has not developed … as was to be expected”) suggests that someone ‘in the know’ feared that he might struggle in the first-class game. Batsman School Runs Average WM Hemingway Uppingham 637 57.91 JR Mason Winchester College 777 48.56 GJ Mordaunt Wellington College 637 45.50 GO Snith Charterhouse 699 43.69 GB Raikes Shrewsbury 514 42.83 CE Champain Cheltenham College 594 39.60 The Salopian also noted that Raikes and William Oakley, his contemporary at Shrewsbury, had just played in the freshman’s soccer match at Oxford but was, of course, unaware that great careers awaited them both in the association game, careers in which they would be closely linked together as goalkeeper and full back until Raikes’ retirement from ‘big’ football (see chapters three and four). note 1: Crownthorpe is a tiny village and parish of 685 acres, directly adjoined the parish of Carleton Forehoe. In common with the latter parish the majority of the land belonged to Lord Wodehouse. In 1864 the population was a mere 97. Crownthorpe was served by the church of St James, now redundant. note 2: The daughter was Lilias Kathleen Cochrane Raikes, who will reappear in chapter ten. note 3: Kenneth played six first-class games for Wales, scoring one fifty against the MCC and taking a career best of 7-28 against Ireland. He also made 119 appearances for Monmouthshire in the Minor Counties Championship, plus one for Glamorgan 2 nd XI.