Lives in Cricket No 50 - Tom Emmett

121 wanted to succeed and ‘his expression was something to be remembered when he retired for a ‘blob’’ in a local game. Emmett used his knowledge, skills, reputation and personality to secure greater respect and opportunity than almost any other professional cricketer in England for two decades. His relationship with Lord Hawke was one of mutual respect and was of value in later years when he needed assistance to find employment after retiring from the first-class game. As Coldham put it (while unnecessarily slurring Emmett’s period in charge): Against all odds the two men formed an enduring affection and respect for each other, a friendship of a kind. Their friendship was always guarded, but it was nevertheless robust enough to survive Emmett’s departure from Yorkshire cricket at a time when it had become apparent that Hawke had embarked upon a campaign to ‘de- Emmettise’ Yorkshire cricket. 90 Lord Harris too felt warmly towards Emmett. Coldham again suggests Harris had got to know Emmett and George Ulyett during the 1878-79 tour of Australia, when Emmett made one his most famous observations. Suffering from sea sickness, he appeared on deck when things were calmer and saw Harris having a cigarette. Harris observed that Emmett did not look well, to which Emmett responded, ‘I don’t think they’ve had the heavy roller on, my Lord!’ 91 Nearly a decade later, it was also Harris who helped Emmett get the coaching post at Rugby. How close any of these relationships were is hard to tell, but at his death, Cricket commented that Emmett ‘was on the most friendly terms with the great amateurs of the day, to whom he spoke with a freedom and an absence of reserve which never failed to interest and please them, even when his opinions were given in the most plain spoken terms. He was liked by them all, and every professional regarded him as a friend.’ For all his connections, however, Emmett suffered from the slights that Victorian society routinely presented to a working-class man. Only appointed as Yorkshire county captain ‘in the absence of a Gentleman’, he was not permitted to move everywhere in the Bramall Lane pavilion. 92 Although appointed captain, he had to stand aside for the far less able Rev.E.S.Carter as captain on several occasions in 1878 and 1881. When abroad, he and George Ulyett, the only two professionals on the 1879- 80 tour, were housed separately from the amateurs, no doubt in less pleasant accommodation. It is also hard not to feel that he was being gently patronised by Lady Londesborough in her carriage at Scarborough, when she would have Emmett brought to her, and they would talk together in private. Her Ladyship apparently chuckled at the richness of the old cricketer’s dialect. ‘ ‘It’s this way’, explained Tom, ‘I tries to suit myself to my company, but if I just drops out a flowery thing or two, her ladyship only smiles the more affable, which sets me at my ease like. And that’s how we get on so well together, she and me.’ ’ 93 As a result, for all the admiration he received, Emmett still lacked confidence about his position in life, and felt slighted at the end of his career. He Personality, performance and popularity