A Lifetime In Cricket (Part VI)

In Part Five of 'A Lifetime in Cricket' I recalled memorable opponents and quirky incidents that occurred in local cricket, particularly in Somerset and Dorset, before the advent of league cricket.

I will now move back to Devon and consider my memories of clubs from my home county, both before and after Axminster Town Cricket Club had first joined the Exeter and East Devon League, followed by the Devon League.

Honiton Cricket Club, based at Mountbatten Park, was never our favourite place to play. The club formerly played under the name of Honiton RBL as their headquarters were at the Royal British Legion Club.

The cricket club shared the ground with Honiton Football Club and, as we know well at Axminster with Harry's Field, the "crossover" between the respective seasons was never easy to manage.

We always seemed to play against Honiton at the start of the season and the outfield at the football club end was never great – often displaying a myriad of football stud marks and bare patches.

However, we probably also had an aversion for Honiton, as they had some useful players and some who often took us to the cleaners. I particularly remember Bob Grove (of Axe Cliff Golf Club fame), a teacher who always scored heavily against us, as did Brian Cann.

Mike Bright, Phil Tansley and Roger Hill took regular wickets and good all-rounders were Dave Rew, who I also played football against, Brian Cann and a young Australian, Connel Dunbar.

Our most annoying adversary at Honiton was Eddie Marks, a wicket-keeper, who constantly distracted you whilst you were trying to concentrate on seeing off Mike Bright and Roger Hill. Eventually, his ploy worked, as you became so fed up with his nattering, that your concentration lapsed and you were back in the hutch.

The redeeming facet of dear old Eddie Marks was that he had an attractive daughter who did the scoring, whilst younger Axminster players often fought to assist her.

An occasional opponent at Honiton was Dave Retter – the renowned Honiton Town Crier and a delightful man. We also had excellent relationships with Terry Linsdell, former secretary and chairman – a great guy to deal with.

We always enjoyed our matches with Ottery St Mary, where the wickets were always good and the company entertaining. When I first captained Axminster, the Ottery captain was John Lovell ,a useful although somewhat dour batsman.

I also remember Tom Buckley, who regularly took wickets against us and "Dick" Whittington. I don't think his real name was Dick, but Whittingtons are always Dicks.

In later years John Tierney made runs and took wickets against us, whilst Rob Bradshaw-Smith was an excellent batsman. I also remember Martin Miller, who not only played cricket and was a tennis coach, working for East Devon District Council's leisure department.

Always good teas at Ottery St Mary

Just up the road from Ottery St Mary was Feniton, who played on a large sports field, with very little character. We always had a tussle with Francis Pyle. On occasions when he annoyed us, our players sometimes thought that Pyle was a pain in the a**e – excuse the pun!

John Virgin was a good batter – and if you got him early, there was always Pete Avery, Mark Kingdom, Graham Tucker and Adrian Codling to contend with. Stuart Bright took wickets against us. He wasn't a big man, but he raced in to the wicket with small strides and propelled the ball at a hasty pace.

We occasionally played friendlies or cup matches against Sidmouth, who were several tiers above us in the quality of their players and the standard of cricket they played. They rarely came to Axminster to play, but preferred to host us at Fortfield Terrace, a lovely ground with views out towards the sea.

Players I remember were Lloyd Baker, a classy batsman, fast bowler Steve Palfrey, the long-serving Gerald Bess, bowler John Rhodes and batsman Drummond Johnstone. I also remember John Harris, who played for Somerset and became a county umpire.

He then returned to his beloved Sidmouth where at one time he was captain, groundsman, opening bat, chief wicket-taker and even worked behind the bar.

In my career in local cricket, I didn't have too many performances to remember – but I do recall a half-century at Fortfield, which included two sixes, which clattered against the wall of the Fortfield Hotel.

High-quality sides we played against in the seventies and eighties also included Exmouth, where yet again we were invited to play at the Maer Ground, but Exmouth rarely came to North Street. We played at the Maer, against the likes of Somerset's Nick Folland, Dave Fouracre, Phil Holland, a fine player who later joined Axminster and Jim Wood, father of Somerset and Notts batsman, Matthew Wood.

Jim Wood was a canny bowler who I knew well through his 14 years as chairman of the Devon Cricket Board.

Serious flooding

In the same neck of the woods, we regularly played against Budleigh Salterton, whose ground has been subjected on several occasions to serious flooding. There was a photograph displayed in the pavilion, where the flood-water was level with the fascia boards on the pavilion roof.

East Devon District Council are currently promoting the Lower Otter Restoration Project , part of which will be the relocation of Budleigh Cricket Club to a new ground which will not be susceptible to flooding.

I remember Barry Dawson at Budleigh – father of Bobby Dawson, who played for Gloucestershire for many seasons. I also remember local farmer Bruce Ellett, who sold me a ticket for a raffle the club were promoting that season for a cricket bat, with signatures for the 1971 England and Pakistan teams, together with Yorkshire and Lancashire.

At the end of that season, Bruce contacted me to tell me that I had won the bat. It still has pride of place, hung on the wall of my office.

I also have fond memories of a match Axminster played at Budleigh in 1973. The Budleigh bowling attack soon made inroads into the Axminster batting line-up and wickets tumbled. It wasn't long before Axminster were a disastrous 48 for 9, with Terry Guppy (our regular number 11) joining Phil Spong at the wicket.

The pair managed to stay there and started to look comfortable. The rest of our team – back in the pavilion, couldn't believe what we were witnessing, as Budleigh tried everything to remove Phil and Terry, but the Axminster score mounted.

We reached 100 - with the last wicket pair still at the crease, having put together a 50 partnership. When the score climbed to an unbelievable 159 our heroes had put on over 100 together – in fact a last-wicket partnership of 111, a record for Axminster – probably never to be beaten.

Budleigh were totally deflated and although they had a good batting line-up on paper, they were so demoralised that we bowled them out cheaply and won the match.

Budleigh Salterton Cricket Club was also "home" to the Evans family. Father Geoff was a wicket-keeper for Devon when he was in his prime and he lived adjacent to the Budleigh ground. Son Greg is I believe currently chairman of the club.

Younger son Matthew is a good friend of mine. Matt played in the same Devon age group teams as my son Robert – so we regularly met up with Matt, Geoff and Mrs Evans, when following the fortunes of the team.

I then met Matt again at Somerset County Cricket Club, where he managed the "Centre of Excellence" Indoor Cricket School at Taunton when I started my career at the County Ground as Somerset Cricket Development Officer.

Matt moved on from Taunton when he became Cricket Development Officer for Devon and is currently CEO for Active Devon, a position he has held with distinction for several years.

When Matt was at Taunton we had some good times – not least when Matt's brother Greg arranged a stag weekend In Jerey, prior to Matt's wedding. About 15 of us were invited to play golf in Jersey during the day and drink as much beer as we could manage in the evenings.

Sea-sick for 14 hours

However, we were not told how we were going to get to Jersey – the arrangements being managed by Greg. We were asked to meet at a car-park in Teignmouth and were then told that we would be travelling in a converted 1947 trawler!

We were happy enough to get on board and the beer started flowing. However, I am the world's worst sailor and I was sea-sick before we had left Teignmouth harbour, where the water was like a mill-pond. The old trawler was slow and stunk of diesel.

I don't know how I finally arrived at St Hellier, as I was sea-sick for the whole journey, which took 14 hours. I couldn't believe how the others coped – as only one or two of them reacted to the sea in the same way as me.

However, I recovered once we were in Jersey and on the golf course, part of the deal being that Matt, as it was his stag-do had to wear ladies clothing for the whole of the time in Jersey – even on the golf course.

More concerning for me was the journey home and how was I going to cope with the sea-sickness. I sought out a chemist in St Hellier and asked for advice. The chemist gave me some sea-sick pills and advised me to drink gallons of water – NOT BEER, which was a shame.

We played three rounds of golf in three days and during the last nine holes, the wind started to whistle and we finished the round in a storm.

After we left the golf course, we headed for the trawler, dreading what was in store for us. It wasn't long before we were encountering the storm. I have never experienced anything like it – this battered old trawler riding the waves of a Force 9 gale.

We all thought this was the end and we would be drowned. However, I had taken the sea-sick pills, poured gallons of water down my throat – and had no sea-sickness….but the others, who were perfectly all right on the way over, but kicked off the journey with a few beers, were desperately ill in the storm.

Thankfully, after 16 hours in the Force 9, we all arrived back in Teignmouth, thanking the crew for our safe delivery.

The story is concluded, when we received information a few months later that the company which owned the trawler was being dragged through the courts over the condition of its trawlers, which were being condemned as totally unsafe, with dozens of serious faults - and we were on one of them, in a Force 9 gale.

Memorable trips

Back to cricket. We also made trips to Torquay, where we played against Torquay and Barton. However, our most memorable trips to Torquay were those when we played against St Marychurch. We always travelled by coach, together with our wives, girlfriends and families, even though there was drinking involved in the evening.

The cricket was always competitive, as St Marychurch were of a similar standard to ourselves. I mentioned previously that our dear Dennis Davis, always played against St Marychurch – and we never had a problem getting a team to travel there, despite the fact that the wicket was desperately quick, very different to North Street or Cloakham Lawns. It certainly suited our bowlers, including Pete Scotchford, who took nine wickets in one game.

Dave Pike always playe at St Marychurch – like Den Davis, Dave kept us entertained. Usually, the coach driver would drop us off just outside the ground, but one year we had a coach driver, with a challenging attitude who decided that he could manoeuvre his coach around the bend, avoiding a number of obstacles, through the narrow gate and into the ground.

But he couldn't. He got stuck amid various suggestions from our players on how to navigate his coach. Dave Pike put on his best "Blakey" voice from 'On The Buses'. "Get this bus aat!" he cried. Ironically, it wasn't long before the Torquay park manager arrived who looked just like Inspector Blake – "You can't park there" he said "Get this bus out" – to peals of laughter from our gang still in the bus.

I remember some great friends from St Marychurch – all-rounder Frank Burley, batsman Jeff Lang (who also played for Barton) and Barry Page Dove, who owned the hotel where we normally finished up after the game. We were also introduced to the Oochy-Koochy game by Graham Monk and Chris Walker. More about the Oochy-Koochy game in a later edition of Moulding's Memories.

Most coach-drivers wanted to get back home as soon as they could after the St Marychurch trip - but we had others who were more accommodating. On one occasion, when the singing led by Dennis Davis was going well, the driver said "you lot seem to be enjoying yourselves – we'll take a longer journey home through the countryside".

Well that was OK but it was dark and he didn't know where the devil he was going. We seemed to be going for ever when Dennis Davis, just about standing up at the front of the coach, said the immortal words "We're in Oopottery".

We played against a number of sides in and around Exeter, which included Exeter CC of course; Exeter Civil Service, where I remember Barry Jarrett; Whipton; Exwick; London and Manchester Assurance; Countess Wear and Alphington.

We used to really enjoy our trips to Winslade Park in Cyst St Mary to play against the London and Manchester Assurance Company. Winslade Park is a late-18th century mansion built for an East India merchant. It has magnificent terraces, wonderful grounds and a lake.

When London and Manchester occupied the property, they had installed a delightful bar, social centre and swimming pool, which they made available to visiting teams and their families. Axminster Cricket Club certainly made the best of this attraction.

We had some tight matches with London and Manchester, where I remember two good all-rounders in John Dibsdall and Sandy Sandford.

Winslade Park is currently set for a comprehensive development scheme led by Burrington Estates.

Intimidating opponents

Countess Wear were blessed with two intimidating opponents – Terry Thorne and Ron Partridge. Terry Thorne was basically a left-handed slogger – but he had a tremendous eye and often carted us all over the place. Our bowlers always felt that they could get him out with every ball they bowled – but inevitably the ball finished up being hit out of the ground.

Ron Partridge bowled metronomically and he used to growl and snort if he beat the bat without getting your wicket. I also knew Ron Partridge through business as he was a roofing contractor who had carried out some tiling and slating work for my firm.

We often played against Alphington and I remember Ian Ainscough, Dave Mills and the annoying Stuart Pound, a little man who usually opened the batting and nurdled the ball around. He didn't seem to be scoring quickly, but we would look up at the scoreboard and without breaking into a sweat, Stuart had reached 50– and then on towards 100.

Also, travelling in the Exeter direction, west of Axminster, we encountered a number of illustrious opponents, often playing on beautiful country grounds.

One such side was Kentisbeare, where the ground had plenty of width, but extremely short boundaries behind the bowlers arm. At one end, the boundary was so short that one or two of our bowlers, with long run-ups actually started their run-up from a grassy bank outside the boundary line.

I recall Nigel Gillett, a consistent batsman, and John McCarten, a useful bowler, who moved the ball around prodigiously. However, we enjoyed playing against Kentisbeare and enjoyed drinking at "The Four Horseshoes" which has now been renamed as "The Keeper's Cottage"

Not far away from Kentisbeare is Cullompton, whose ground can easily be seen alongside the M5 motorway. The ground had short boundaries, which suted batsmen Mike Baker, Alan Garnham and Dave Percy. Likewise, the Axminster batsmen also enjoyed the quick accumulation of runs which the short boundaries permitted.

Many years ago, we had enjoyed a Saturday match against Cullompton and then played one of our regular friendlies on Sunday, with several of our players, including myself, turning out for both games. Later on Monday, I became badly ill, with a dose of gastro-enteritis. I was pretty well living near the loo.

Following a few phone-calls we all began to realise the same illness was being experienced by most of our cricketers who had played against Cullompton. One of our players who was suffering and was playing in our team, was Dr Chris Sutton, one of our regular cricketers in those days. Inevitably Chris wanted to get to the bottom of it. (Another pun, sorry!).

Specialists were sent to the Cullompton ground and an inspection of the rubbish bins revealed an empty luncheon-meat can, which under microscopic investigation divulged that the luncheon meat sandwiches were the culprits.

In the Mid-Devon direction we played one or two games against Tiverton Heathcote and Tiverton CC. In that area we also played against Halberton & Sampford Peverell, whose bowling attack often included Fred Harding and Ray Radford who were useful performers.

In later years, I knew Ray Radford well as we were colleagues on Devon County Council and we are often seated near each other whilst watching cricket at Somerset CCC.

Also in Mid-Devon we encountered Bradninch, who we usually played on a Sunday in the middle of the summer, when it was often warm and pleasant. They had a village ground - right out in the countryside and they had a well-supported bar.

We used to arrive at the ground at about 1 pm and there were dozens of beer and cider drinkers, lying around the place half-scammered. Thus, there were usually some raucous shouts from the boundary, when things went well for the home side, or not-so-well for us visitors. One of our players who came in for rowdy cheers was Dave Pike.

Bradninch booze boys

We were playing in a cup match and were fielding. Dave usually fielded on the boundary as he had a good arm, enabling the ball to whistle straight back in to the keeper's gloves. On this occasion, the ball raced out towards Dave, fielding on the boundary in his customary position.

"Let it go Pikey," came the call from the keeper... and he did let it go, right through his legs for a boundary four. Whoops of laughter and cries of derision came from the boozey boys from Bradninch.

In the seventies and eighties we enjoyed playing at Whimple, on a lovely ground owned by Whiteways Cider, with cider orchards around the boundary edge and a huge oak tree within the normal playing area. It was dead-ball and two runs if you hit the tree.

Whimple had some good players – Roger Smith, a high-scoring batsman, Adrian Witton, Colin Fildew and Steve Palfrey, an excellent bowling attack. Unfortunately, Whiteways wished to capitalise on the ground, which was scheduled for housing and they paid the costs of producing a new ground for the cricket club, which over time has proved to be a success.

Another ground we enjoyed was Broadclyst, who played on the Killerton National Trust estate. They resisted playing league cricket for many years, but still had some good cricketers, playing in Sunday cricket. This included Alan Baggs, son Richard (who has played for Exmouth for many seasons) and my former East Devon District Council colleague, the late Derek Button, an aggressive batsman, who enjoyed attacking our bowling.

Closer to home, we played against a number of local village teams. These included Sidbury, where we first came across our dear friend Brian Perry, who enjoyed matches with Axminster and ultimately played for us for many seasons, and sadly passed away a few years ago. Another team where we played 2nd XI cricket was Offwell, with crafty bowler Roy Land.

There was also Upottery, where Mark Richards hit 6 sixes in an over, where we came up against batsmen Gary Kennard and Nigel Wyatt, and bowler Mike Bright.

Just back along the seven-mile straight from Upottery and down the lane was Stockalnd and Yarcombe where we found the legend that was Gerald Lye, an old-school country cricketer, who called a spade a spade.

Gerald's son David was an excellent batsman, who played many times for Devon and had a couple of games for Somerset 2nd XI. We also came across bowler Richard Reed at Stockland, together with the Summers brothers, Mike and Roger. Mike soon decided that he would try his luck with Axminster and had many fruitful seasons for Axminster – a good bowler who also enjoyed a few pints after the game.

Every year, we played an evening 20-overs match against the Masters' Common Room at Allhallows School, where the stunning cricket grounds were kept in top-class condition. These matches were great fun, with free beer provided after the game - and those we played against included Graham Jones and John Cloke, who later played for Axminster and has been such a great supporter of Cloakham Lawn Sports Centre.

It was also a delight to play against Bob Cottam and Maurice Hill, two former, highly-respected first-class cricketers, who for many seasons were employed to run cricket at Allhallows for the fortunate young students. I have mentioned Bob Cottam, in an earlier edition of Moulding's Memories, as a cricketer who played four times in tests for England and had a fine career with Hampshire and Northants. He was appointed bowling coach for England for three seasons.

Bob had three sons – Michael, David and Andrew, all good cricketers, with Andy playing for both Derbyshire and Somerset. Maurice Hill played for Nottinghamshire for 12 seasons and finished his career with Derbyshire, having scored over 10,000 fist-class runs. Maurice's son Greg, a useful batsman, played for Derbyshire 2nd XI.

We also played Sunday cricket against The Blacksmiths, a team based in and around the Blackdown Hills. Interestingly, The Blacksmiths boasted talented Axminster cricketers, namely Nick Yool, Chris Friend and Michael Hankey, who always enjoyed a spirited game against their home club.

Axminster also played a number of enjoyable friendlies and matches against touring sides. These included the Brighton Cryptics, with huge West Indian Hugh King, Winchmore Hill and Spar Ramblers. Spar have been touring East Devon for many years and are made up of cricketers from Kent and Surrey.

I remember batsman Tom Carmichael and a tall aristocratic gentleman called Adrian, who always arrived early in his smart Jaguar car, which had its boot opened up and a range of beers, wines and refreshments displayed. Spar Ramblers certainly played their cricket in style.

The next edition of 'Moulding's Memories' will be Part Seven of 'A Lifetime in Cricket'. This will include wacky fundraising and the drinking habits of Axminster Town Cricket Club.