Lives in Cricket No 47 - Brian Sellers

120 about it in the dressing room at Bradford: Quite clearly there had been no time for Yorkshire to call a committee meeting. I was soon to realise that the decision to release me had been taken by the chairman, Brian Sellers, who declared that if I didn’t want to play for them I could go. Someone evidently told other players what Sellers said exactly. Geoff Boycott quoted it in his own autobiographies: “Brian Sellers said to him: ‘If you want to go, then you can fucking well go. Fuck off.’ He actually used those words.” Leaving aside the bad manners, that Illingworth had to cover up, and who Sellers said it to – as a comment over the ‘phone to John Nash the secretary, some suggested - it looked like the same old outcome between employer and worker; as soon as a man sought a better deal for himself, the club threw him out. Sellers was carrying on a tradition that he saw in his first full season, when Yorkshire released another ageing player, Percy Holmes. In old age, Sellers described the county cap as a ‘bond’ between the county and player; and if the player got his ‘ticket’, ‘he always got 18 months’ notice’ (not true; Johnny Wardle didn’t). Sellers claimed that the ‘end of season’ dismissal changed when Yorkshire finished with Holmes in August 1933: … he had bad knees, that was the only reason, a question of fitness, you see. Well, Percy got his ticket in the second or third week of August. He didn’t complain about it. The Lancashire and Birmingham leagues would have jumped at him. But by the time he got his ticket they had all signed up their pro’s, so poor Percy’s bad luck changed the procedure. But it was still a gentleman’s agreement that players would know if they were to get their ticket by July 1 – that was the deadline. We can query whether ‘poor Percy’ had bad luck or whether in fact the club chose to do what suited it, as soon as Holmes began to flag. And did Holmes not complain because complaining would have done him no good?! The press took the club’s side. The Yorkshire Post at the time reported that the committee ‘had been influenced by the desire to give the batsman a full opportunity to make arrangements for league cricket or a coaching engagement for next season’. Either Sellers’ memory was at fault, or the committee had given Holmes less ‘opportunity’ than it claimed. The club in fairness did have its own interests to protect. It wanted only the best first eleven, and a flow of players into that eleven. Significantly, in his interview in old age, Sellers went from that Holmes story to the ‘poaching’ of young players, ‘a cause of great anxiety for Yorkshire’: It cost about £1000 to bring a youngster up to first team standard. There was a lot of underhand work went on by counties – and there’s a lot still going on today, but now it’s among the players themselves. The hot poker suddenly arrived when Raymond Illingworth asked for a three-year contract or he’d want his release. He was a forward-thinker, before his time, you couldn’t blame him. But y’see, it was new – it upset the bond of trust, caused an imbalance in the Yorkshire tradition ... money has killed the game – it is very difficult today – you’ve got to have a squad (as you say) of When I’m 64: Illingworth and Close