Lives in Cricket No 46 - George Raikes

5 Foreword I am delighted to have been asked to write the foreword to Stephen Musk’s latest contribution to sporting literature. As readers of his earlier work will be well aware, Stephen’s interests tend to lie outside the mainstream and, in this study of George Barkley Raikes, he has explored the life of a relatively obscure cleric whose achievements in the late Victorian and Edwardian sporting world merit greater attention than they have hitherto received. As a football custodian – to borrow the favoured term of the era – Raikes’ career was brief but dramatic, emerging from club games in Norfolk and representing Oxford University to gain four caps for England before his virtual retirement from the game at the age of 23. Stephen has researched both rise and withdrawal assiduously before drawing interesting conclusions on the reasons for the latter. For 15 years prior to the First World War, Raikes’ sporting commitments focused almost exclusively on cricket. After a modest first-class career at Oxford, he moved into minor county cricket with Norfolk and not only captained the side to two championship titles but led from the front in all departments of the game. For those whose inclination is to deprecate achievement in the second-class game, this may seem modest but when Raikes’ influence can be not unfavourably compared to that of S.F.Barnes – as Stephen does – then he cannot be dismissed as a minor cricketer. The study also allows Stephen to investigate three pieces of contested territory: leg-spin bowling, the amateur ethos and, in the most historically fascinating argument of the work, Raikes’ entitlement to be described as a ‘muscular Christian’. All three matters receive close analysis and readers will not be disappointed in the cogency of the discussion or the conviction of the conclusions. Raikes’ role in the development of wrist-spin bowling may not be central but neither was it wholly peripheral. He was at Oxford a few years before the billiard table experiments of B.J.T.Bosanquet led to the googly being added to the repertoire but Varsity links undoubtedly kept him in touch with the most radical change in the game since the introduction of over- arm bowling. Four decades later Don Bradman may still have been bowled by Eric Hollies in his final Test innings without the intervention of Raikes in the art, but there can be little doubt that he brought the mystery delivery not only to Norfolk but to other parts of the country where he played his cricket. At Oxford, Raikes was a contemporary of C.B.Fry but even a performer of such great distinction in a range of sports could not single-handedly uphold the amateur ethos in an era when ‘professionalism’ was threatening