Lives in Cricket No 48 - Maurice Leyland

in at number four to join opener Herbert Sutcliffe. What followed was nothing short of a massacre. Only four and a half hours play was possible at Fartown that day yet the 98 overs bowled by the Glamorgan attack yielded no fewer than 387 runs with Maurice (189) and Herbert (147) still at the wicket and their unbroken stand worth 323. Unfortunately there was no further play in this game but, while no one will ever know what that partnership might have realised, those two record stands involving Maurice were only broken in 2009 by Anthony McGrath and Joe Sayers, and 2014 by Adam Lyth and Adil Rashid, respectively. Although he was out for a duck in Yorkshire’s game with the West Indian tourists, at Headingley, at the beginning of July, he was obviously still in the selectors’ minds for he was chosen to represent the Players (the professionals) against the Gentlemen (the amateurs) in their annual game at Lords. For the best part of a century it virtually assumed Test Trial status. Maurice, playing his first such game, again took the opportunity to demonstrate his potential with 36 in a hard-hitting sixth wicket stand of 68 with Tate before falling once again to Jupp. He didn’t get a bat in the second innings but did have Somerset’s Malcolm Lyon caught behind by George Duckworth to end a 66 run opening stand with Aidan Crawley and finished with figures of one for nine off five overs. Crawley, incidentally, was a man you could say was ‘in the news’ later in life for he became Editor in Chief of Independent Television News. There was an inevitability about Maurice’s eventual graduation to international cricket and his debut duly arrived at the beginning of August. But, if you are looking for fairytale endings stick to Enid Blyton. The ‘Cricket Fates’ obviously don’t read scripts. Maurice, relishing his newly won allrounder tag, grabbed the second West Indian wicket to fall when he had George Challenor caught at slip, by Wally Hammond, just before lunch in his very first over in Test cricket. Unfortunately for Yorkshire’s newest Test player he was to join the band of players to commence their international careers with a duck when he was bowled midway through the second day’s play to became one of Herman Griffith’s six victims. With England going on to win by an innings there was no other chance to shine but, thankfully, his place on the 1928, an unforgettable year 69