Lives in Cricket No 48 - Maurice Leyland

103 subduing the ever growing menace of the ‘Tiger’ - leg spinner Bill O’Reilly. It was during this tour that Maurice allowed himself to make the oft quoted, and apparently uncharacteristically provocative, “I’ve got him taped and he knows it,” remark about O’Reilly. That the big Australian was intended to hear it is unquestionable but, that it was said to ‘wind-up’ O’Reilly, rather than boastfully proclaim superiority over him, is equally certain. The fact is, this was just a tussle that both men relished and, using statistics, both could claim to have the upper hand. O’Reilly was responsible for dismissing Maurice no fewer than nine times in Test matches but his figures are significantly worse than his overall Test average when bowling against an England side with Maurice in it. For the record, O’Reilly’s 27 Tests brought him 144 wickets at 22.59; against England his figures were 19 games, 102 wickets at 25.36; and against Maurice’s England it was 16 games, 83 wickets at 25.97. O’Reilly was said to detest left-handed batsmen; he is often quoted as saying, “They should have been shot at birth”, and in RS Whitington’s book Time of the Tiger the author addresses the theory of many ‘expert judges’ that O’Reilly particularly disliked bowling to Maurice. ‘The truth is’, said Whitington, ‘Bill never disliked bowling at any batsman - he just disliked BATSMEN!’ Nevertheless, there was no hiding the devilish delight he felt at watching Maurice struggle. For example, during the 1934 Scarborough Festival Maurice found himself up against left arm wrist spinner Les ‘Chuck’ Fleetwood-Smith and hopelessly out of touch. Fleetwood-Smith was born a natural right-hander but having practised bowling with his left he discovered his ability to spin the ball prodigiously and persevered with it. At Scarborough O’Reilly was fielding at mid off to Fleetwood-Smith and recalled: “It was a rarity for Leyland to put a bat on ball of his. I said, ‘For God’s sake Chuck, don’t get him out. I’ve been wanting to see him like this all summer. Let me watch a little longer.’ Chuck mesmerised Maurice that day. If he had achieved merely ordinary control of his remarkable ability to spin he’d be regarded probably as the greatest bowler of all time.” However, despite all this, he undoubtedly had a sneaking regard Ashes to Ashes