Lives in Cricket No 5 - Rockley Wilson

for one of these, against Worcestershire when he scored 63 runs in the first innings, but took no wickets in a rain-affected match. Any disappointment in not appearing more often was allayed by his selection for two matches at the Scarborough Cricket Festival in September, for MCC against Yorkshire and for the Gentlemen against the Players. The MCC side, captained by W.Findlay of Oxford, who later was to become Secretary of MCC, was not a particularly strong one to take on the County Champions at full strength. But Yorkshire were beaten by 26 runs in two days in a low scoring match. The outstanding performance was that of Somerset’s L.C.Braund, one of three England-capped players in MCC’s team, who took six for 77 and six for 34 in the two Yorkshire innings with his leg-breaks, and top scored in MCC’s first innings. Rockley was not invited to bowl at any stage of the match but he did make a most useful 24 runs, batting at No.5 in MCC’s second innings of 100. Rockley probably regarded his selection for the Gentlemen against the Players as the greater honour. The first-class game had expanded considerably since the first Gentlemen v Players match at Lord’s in 1806, but the fixture was still a prestigious one. Scarborough had first hosted the fixture in 1885, when the Gentlemen won by an innings and 35 runs, W.G.Grace scoring 174 out of a total of 263 on a treacherous wicket. After the turn of the century, Scarborough became a regular venue along with Lord’s and The Oval for the three Gentlemen v Players matches in the season. 32 The match at Lord’s was clearly the outstanding fixture of the three and Pelham Warner considered that Rockley Wilson was one of the three best amateurs in his own time never to have played for the Gentlemen at Lord’s. However, the status of the matches at the other two grounds was perhaps diluted by the practice of choosing a preponderance of southern players for the match at The Oval, and of northerners for that at Scarborough. Thus in the 1902 match at Scarborough, the Players included seven Yorkshiremen, including George Hirst as captain. The Gentlemen were captained by Lord Hawke and included F.S.Jackson, T.L.Taylor and E.Smith as well as Rockley Wilson. 33 Although 40 After Graduation 32 It continued to be so until 1962, when the distinction between amateurs and professionals in English first-class cricket was abolished and the fixture discontinued. Of the 39 matches played at Scarborough, the Players won 13, the Gentlemen won five and 19 were drawn. 33 Emphasising the class distinction in the venerable fixture, those appearing for the Gentlemen were accommodated in the Grand Hotel, and it was grand in Edwardian times, while the Players team had to find lodgings in the town.