Howzat!

Cricket. The game of gentlemen amateurs, sportsmen with long flowing beards and voluminous sideburns, bowlers in, er, bowlers. Eternally travelling south of the Tropic of Capricorn in search of sporting glory. The image of a passenger list from September 1891 shows Lord Sheffield’s Eleven, sailing in First Saloon class from London to Sydney to give the Aussies the customary good drubbing.

Among the XI is the captain WG Grace, the last Victorian cricketer to remain in our early C21st public consciousness. At this date, William Gilbert was a sprightly 43 year old and well able to bat back anything that young pup Shane Warne could have thrown at him. He was to die in 1915, after a decent innings of 67 years.

For more on Grace, visit Wisden here.

Images

Stephen Rigden

Fri, 12 Jan 2007

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