Lives in Cricket No 50 - Tom Emmett

129 the Sheffield Evening Telegraph reporter noted that the two Surrey bowlers ‘found no difficulty in making the ball cut all sorts of capers, and as the dead and gone Tom Emmett once said, ‘it stood up and stared at one.’ Many commentators made reference to the ‘old principle of Tom Emmett’ – that of a wide and a wicket. In the Lancashire Evening Post in August 1930, a match report on a game between Nottinghamshire and Lancashire observed that an incident in play ‘was after the manner of old Tom Emmett, who often bowled a wide and then took a wicket’. In the Western Daily Press in 1929, Emmett was remembered in a column which included him as one of a number of men who ‘seemed to be gifted with that singular gift in thought and action that comes like a ray of sunshine into a gloomy environment or like a bombshell at a Peace Society meeting.’ And in November 1933, three-times Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin spoke at the 28 th annual banquet of the Society of Yorkshiremen in London about his associations with Yorkshire. He recalled watching Twenty-Two of the Midlands play against an eleven of England. Here he witnessed ‘two glorious men there whom I shall never forget – Tom Emmett and George Ulyett. I was near enough to hear some of George Ulyett’s jokes and I only wish I could repeat them tonight.’ Finally, Tom Emmett has reappeared even more recently, albeit briefly, as a character in a 2011 novel – ‘The Player’s Curse’ by Brian Thompson - involving a curse laid on W.G.Grace. In one scene on Woodhouse Moor, the competitors in an archery contest are dining in the evening, but the centre of attention is Tom Emmett, ‘a merry man not yet in his forties, with a nose that shone like a nightwatchman’s lantern’. A woman approaches him for his autograph for her godson and Emmett offers to show him his ‘old sostenutor’ if he comes down to Sheffield. Unsurprisingly, the book’s heroine finds the whole incident unintelligible. 108 He may have been dead for over 100 years, but the words and deeds of Tom Emmett live on in the imagination of some, even if we are no clearer why Emmett called his demon ball ‘his sostenutor’. Tom Emmett personified Yorkshire cricket. For several subsequent generations of Yorkshire cricket followers and players, he was a point of reference for measuring progress of all kinds on the cricket field. When Bobby Peel made a first impression he was referred to as “Young Tom Emmett”. In 1893, George Hirst made it clear that he wanted to become ‘a second Tom Emmett’. Five years later, Lord Hawke lavished praise on Wilfred Rhodes for his bowling, stating he was sure ‘our old friend’ Tom Emmett would approve. In 1902, when Hawke himself was asked how long he would like to play for Yorkshire, he said he wanted to beat Tom Emmett’s record of 21 years. Emmett was thus a true benchmark for Yorkshire cricketing greatness, who contributed enormously to the early years of county cricket. He provided a ‘never say die’ determination that would be followed by later generations of players like George Hirst, Brian Close and David Bairstow, and a popular eccentricity that would be seen subsequently with crowd favourites like Roy Kilner and Maurice Leyland. Emmett played hard and played to win, Personality, performance and popularity