Lives in Cricket No 47 - Brian Sellers

65 to the Cambridge Daily News was slow. Sellers gave two hard chances behind the wicket before his century, and an easy one to the captain Hugh Bartlett at 164. Sellers ended the day on 192 not out, having made 98 since tea. On the second, colder day, some knowing spectators applauded Sellers on 195, as that was the highest score by a Yorkshire amateur. He was caught at first slip off the new ball for 204, in five hours, having hit one six and 25 fours; ‘not without blemish’ according to the Cambridge newspaper, but ‘powerful’. The next morning, a ‘mysterious parcel’ arrived at Fenner’s. The headmaster of Sellers’ and Yardley’s old school, Stanley Toyne, a well-read man who was a good enough cricketer to play once for his native Hampshire (against Yorkshire), had sent two miniature bats with messages of congratulation. As so often after an outstanding innings, Sellers slumped; in June he made 146 runs at 13, and 101 at 10.1 in July. He ended 1936 with fewer runs than the season before or after. The Cricketer magazine summed it up as ‘disappointing’. Sellers’ first century against a county came at Nottingham in July 1937, ‘a really great innings’ according to The Times . Harold Larwood and Bill Voce had taken the first four wickets for 50. Off a short run, Larwood was bowling at a pace ‘approaching that of his erstwhile great days’, the Nottingham Journal gushed. Many of Sellers’ runs came off snicks; which was forgivable against Larwood and Voce, in ever poorer light. A sharp shower at 3.40 pm held up play for 40 minutes, which gave the fast men a rest. Voce bowled Smailes – who made the next highest score, 20 – and Wood, and Yorkshire at 138 for seven still needed 39 to make Nottinghamshire bat again. As so often, dropped catches – two in two balls by Larwood, off Verity and Sellers – made all the difference. Verity was bowled exactly 150 behind, and Ellis Robinson saved the follow-on. Batsman, fielder, bowler – and England captain? Brian Sellers batting against Kent in 1938; the picture was signed by him and the slip fielder, Arthur Fagg.