I cannot claim that the XI that forms the body of this post is an absolutely stellar one, but I have a specific reason for this piece of whimsy which I will explain later in the post.

THE XI IN BATTING ORDER

1. Jack Brown (Yorkshire, England, right handed opening batter). A very successful opening batter for his county, and played two legendary innings in games of higher standard than county – a match and series winning 140 in the last match of the 1894-5 Ashes series and a spectacular 163 which helped the Players to chase down 501 against the Gentlemen at Lord’s in 1900.
2. Bill Brown (Australia, right handed opening batter). A successful opening batter after the retirements of two other Bills, Ponsford and Woodfull and before the rise of Barnes and Morris pushed him out of the side.
3. George Brown (Hampshire, England, right handed batter, ). A tough competitor, especially noted for his play against fast bowling.
4. +Ben Brown (Sussex, Hampshire, right handed batter, wicket keeper). A little high in the order, but a very fine batter and keeper at county level.
5. Cameron Green (Australia, right handed batter, right arm fast bowler). A splendid all rounder.
6. *Freddie Brown (Surrey, Northamptonshire, England, right handed batter, leg spinner, right arm medium pacer, captain). He was the youngest member of the 1932-3 Ashes tour party, and didn’t play much on that trip. His next visit to Australia came 18 years later as captain (Norman Yardley and George Mann were both unavailable for business reasons, and England weren’t quite ready for a professional captain, so Brown who had done well as skipper of Northamptonshire ended with the job, and had a respectable series as player and even in a well beaten side was acknowledged to have done a good job as captain. In first class cricket he scored over 13,000 runs and took over 1,200 wickets.
7. Gordon White (South Africa, right handed batter, leg spinner). His test stats look fairly ordinary, but he was an important part of the SA teams of his day, and his FC averages were the right way around – 27.70 with bat, 20.05 with ball.
8. Dougie Brown (Warwickshire, Scotland, right handed batter, right arm fast medium bowler). A good county all rounder, his presence at number eight gives the batting depth. His FC averages, like those of Gordon White are the right way round – 30 with the bat and 28 with the ball in his case. I have placed him below the South African because batting was easier in the 1990s than it had been nine decades earlier, which more than makes up for him having a higher batting average.
9. Jack ‘Farmer’ White (left arm orthodox spin bowler, right handed batter). One of Somerset’s finest cricketers, and his accuracy and stamina were crucial to England’s comprehensive triumph in the 1928-9 Ashes. At Adelaide in that series he toiled through 124 overs across the two Aussie innings and emerged with 13-256 in the match.
10. David ‘Butch’ White (Hampshire, England, right arm fast bowler, left handed tail end bat). The reason for this XI making its appearance. Part of a new ball pairing with Derek Shackleton which was instrumental in the winning of Hampshire’s first ever County Championship. Unplayable on his day, he took over 1,100 FC wickets at 23 a piece, though he gained only two England caps.
11. George Brown (Sussex, Hampshire, fast bowler, right handed tail end batter). He played in the 1820s, and his speed was the stuff of legends – one story which clearly grew in the telling was of a dog walker walking close to the boundary behind the stumps when one of Brown’s rockets beat everyone including the keeper and was racing directly towards the dog, the dog walker attempted to stop the ball with their coat and the ball burst straight through the coat and killed the dog.

This XI is undoubtedly a little light on batting, though the number of all rounders there, highlighted by Dougie Brown being at number eight, is somewhat of a mitigating factor, and the bowling attack is superb. Butch White and George Brown the bowler opening, with Dougie Brown third seamer, Cameron Green fourth seamer, and Farmer White, Gordon White and Freddie Brown spin options (I can’t think of situation in which Freddie’s seam or George Brown the batter’s occasional quick stuff could be required by this team) make this team a serious bowling force.

A SPORTING MEMORABILIA AUCTION COMING UP

On September the 26th James and Sons will be having an auction of various items of sporting memorabilia, including some very old football programmes and a range of items of cricketana. The latter includes three balls with which Butch White performed great bowling feats and which have silver plaques affixed to them detailing the feats in question. Catalogues can be viewed here or here.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Now for my usual sign off…