[Stu]

A little while ago I read that Notts were to create a place to honour and celebrate it's former heroes. I've heard little since and wondered if anyone knew if it had ever happened?

I do recall that the club historian, Peter Wynne-Thomas had decided on criteria including post-1945 players only and also those who had played at least 75 first-class games for the county. The number to be feted was twenty.

Who would be your personal nominations for such commemoration? We all tend to look to our own era's I suppose but a few come very quickly to mind:

Sir Garfield Sobers

Derek Randall

Clive Rice

Richard Hadlee


Any more offers to make up the number?

[rob237]

Stu, on Nov 7 2008, 06:28 PM, said:

Peter Wynne-Thomas had decided on criteria including post-1945 players only...

I wonder why...?

Some of my additional post '45 nominations would be Bill Voce (who played post-war), Charlie Harris, Walter Keeton, Bruce Dooland, Gamini Goonesena, Cyril Poole, Reg Simpson, Geoff Millman, Carlton Forbes, Bruce French...

Cheers
Robt P.

[Stu]

I'm not sure, Rob. It surely dismisses a lot of great players as we know. I can only imagine that he was looking for players who could feasibly have been seen in the flesh. What remains is a bit of a nonsense in a sense when we think about Larwood, the Gunns, Shrewbury et al.

Some interesting selections there. I'm not fortunate enough to have seen Bruce Dooland but his exploits for Notts look to be fantastic. I'd love to have had the opportunity to experience Charlie Harris's humour first-hand too!

[rob237]

Stu, on Nov 7 2008, 06:55 PM, said:

I'd love to have had the opportunity to experience Charlie Harris's humour first-hand too!

Bill Voce had many funny Charlie Harris stories...
One I can recall was that Charlie used to regularly infuriate both Arthur Carr and the catering people by inviting any underfed waif, that he saw near the pavilion, to join the teams for lunch or tea - at the club's expense!
The impromptu invitation was often made as Notts left the field for the break...
Cheers
Robt P.

[Stu]

That's a lovely story.

My favourite one was about the occasion when Notts were compelled to go out to bat in very bad light. Charlie wandered out to open the batting, lighting his way to the wicket with a box of matches!

Did you ever watch Bruce Dooland, Rob? I wasn't of that era but he sounded some bowler indeed. His statistics testify to that. I wondered what kind of a leg spinner he was, trajectory and pace etc?

[rob237]

Only saw him bowl a couple of times...
Rather side on a delivery, a la Benaud - variety of looped deliveries, with a flatter faster ball.
Certainly very few English bats could cope with him on a bouncy wicket.
Famously described by Arlott as: "...having seven types of googly, three he shows you - four he doesn't..."
Cheers
Robt P.

[Stu]

Excellent Arlott quote, thanks!

Perhaps another factor showing what a good bowler Dooland was might have been the Trent Bridge wickets of the day. I'd imagine that the tracks he bowled on would still have conformed to the tradition of the Notts featherbed wickets of the past. Former groundsman Frank Dalling snr used to tell me about the tons of red marl that they used to dress the wicket with and how it made for a somewhat slow and lifeless surface which favoured the batsman.

A couple more additons to a 'hall' might perhaps be:

Chris Broad

Tim Robinson

[rob237]

Certainly true that Dooland benefited from TB wickets to his liking.

Agree with the Broad/Robinson nominations, they both had very similar career records which compared with most others of their era, see below: Pity they, supposedly, didn't 'get on' too well!

http://cricketarchiv.../1757/1757.html

http://cricketarchiv.../1769/1769.html

Perhaps another nominees would be stalwart seamers Harold Butler & Arthur Jepson...

Cheers
Robt P.