Lives in Cricket No 8 - Ernest Hayes

. . . a cricket tragedy. Astill, after scoring seven, hit a ball to cover point and started for a run. Hayes responded and was beaten by a quick return from Flint and the wicket-keeper was able to run him out. Everyone had sorrow in his heart for Hayes who missed a wonderful hundred by a single run. Hayes was batting only an hour and forty minutes to score 99 out of 159. His hits included no fewer than sixteen 4s. No better game has been played for Leicester this season. His display sparkled with all the strokes. He had a great ovation on his return to the pavilion. Hayes set the rest of the side a splendid example. On the opposing side was a youthful Harold Larwood. He bowled in four-over spells, being ‘nursed’ for the Headingley Test. The ‘bodyline’ tour was still six years away, but there is a tidy and satisfying equilibrium in Hayes beginning his thirty-year first-class career against one of Australia’s fastest, Ernie Jones, and ending against one who would shortly put Australia to the sword. The press could make nothing of that, but they revelled in the moment: One Short of a Hundred Outstanding events of the day, of course, were the brilliant innings of 99 by Ernest Hayes and the dazzling 158 not out by Astill – his highest score in first-class cricket. Everyone will congratulate Hayes for a remarkable achievement, none the less remarkable because his score happened to be one short of a hundred. A Tall Order When Hayes was persuaded once more to appear in county cricket at a time when the Leicestershire batting needed a little stiffening, he took on what he knew was a tall order. A ‘come back’ at anything is an ordeal, and a man of 49, who has been out of first-class cricket for some years, and who has in his time been numbered among the best batsmen in the country, steps into the limelight of a somewhat critical world when he seeks to re-assert his powers in the hazardous field of cricket. Well, Ernest Hayes on Trent Bridge on Thursday played an innings of which any first-class batsman in his prime might have been proud. Leicestershire 103