Lives in Cricket No 5 - Rockley Wilson

The 1923 season was a disappointing one for Rockley Wilson and was to prove his last in first-class cricket. Although he played in seven Championship games in the August school vacation, he took only ten wickets at 26.10 and dropped to sixth in the county averages. His best return was three for 46 in his first match in Lancashire’s first innings at Bradford, five wickets in the whole match. His other wickets this season came in ones and twos and there were several innings in which he did not bowl at all. Rockley played one or two useful knocks at the bottom of the order. One such occasion was in the final Championship match of the season, at Taunton, against Somerset. Rockley and Arthur Dolphin put on 31 for the last wicket in Yorkshire’s first innings to take their score from 149 for nine to 180, a lead of 46, from which position Yorkshire went on to win by seven wickets. Rockley finished with, for a tail ender, a presentable batting average of 14.60 in the Championship. As in 1922, Rockley Wilson deputised for his Back to County Cricket 96 The Yorkshire side of 1923, which took the Championship, winning twenty-five matches. Standing (l to r): M.Leyland, G.G.Macaulay, A.Waddington, N.Kilner, H.Sutcliffe, W.Ringrose (scorer). Seated: A.Dolphin, W.Rhodes, E.R.Wilson, G.Wilson (captain), E.Robinson, P.Holmes. On the ground: E.Oldroyd, R.Kilner. This was Rockley Wilson’s last season in first-class cricket.