Lives in Cricket No 52 - Schooled in Cricket (2nd edition)

86 The amateur-professional divide – the way in which the class system in society deeply manifested itself in first- class cricket – had been in strong evidence in Somerset throughout the 1930s. At Somerset as elsewhere amateurs and professionals emerged from different doors of the pavilion. Bill Andrews describes in his autobiography, The hand that bowled Bradman , how amateurs not only took number five, six or seven places in the side during the 1930s irrespective of merit but actually chose their position in the batting order simply because they wanted to bat. In 1946 Somerset now had eight professionals. The seven surviving their pre-war side were Gimblett, Lee, Andrews, Wellard, Luckes, Buse and Hazell and there was the new man, Lawrence. Peter Roebuck in his official history of Somerset County Cricket Club describes him as: “a polite, dedicated leg-spinner from Yorkshire, who had engaged to play for Somerset in 1940 and had kept his A first class career with Somerset Johnny Lawrence at Taunton on the back foot.