Brearley Walter Image 2 Lancashire 1902

Description

Bolton, Lancashire born Walter Brearley was a right-arm fast bowler with what Wisden described as “a rolling gait” with a short run up who put his full and substantial weight into achieving pace and swing. He delivered the ball in a manner not unlike that of Arthur Mold, his predecessor in the Lancashire eleven. Having played League cricket with the Bolton and Manchester clubs, he played County cricket only from the age of 26, making his Lancashire debut in 1902, but his ability to make the ball rise sharply on the somewhat fiery Old Trafford wickets became noticed the following year, but after the wickets became less difficult he was dropped from the side. In 1904 his bowling was a valuable part of Lancashire’s finest season in County cricket as they won the County Championship with sixteen wins and no defeats, but his inability to play late in the season attracted the notice of Wisden.

In 1905 he improved even further, at times bowling well even on wickets too dead to suit a fast bowler. At Lord’s for Gentlemen against Players on a slow pitch that seemed unsuited to him, he prevailed to such an extent in the first innings he took 7-104, and followed this by bowling 2-51 in the second innings. A superb display of pace and length against Somerset at Old Trafford, where he took 9-47 and 8-90, including two wickets with two balls at the end of Somerset’s first innings and two with his first two balls of their second innings, ie 4 wickets in consecutive balls, made him an automatic choice for the Test team for the Fourth Test against Australia at Old Trafford at the end of July. He took four wickets in each innings, and in the final match of the series at The Oval took six out of the 14 wickets to fall, including 5-110 in the first innings. In all cricket that season, he took the wicket of no lesser player than Victor Trumper six times playing for England, the Gentlemen and Lancashire, and finished with an aggregate of 181 wickets at 19.25 each. His tremendous stamina and ability to maintain his fastest pace through even the longest spells of bowling was described as “nothing short of remarkable” by the 1906 Wisden Almanack.

He met with special success in the great local struggles with Yorkshire and in the fourteen matches played between these counties from 1903 to 1911 he dismissed 125 batsmen at 16 runs each. However, having established himself as the best fast bowler in the world, at the end of the season Brearley announced that business claims would prevent him playing again. Although he changed his mind and did play five times for Lancashire in 1906, besides helping Neville Knox to form a remarkably hostile attack for the Gentlemen at Lord’s, he refused to play again for his County until 1908.

In 1907, Brearley only played a handful of first class games for the Gentlemen and a couple of privately raised teams, but was still thought good enough to only just miss out on a Test place at Lord’s against South Africa. 1908 saw Brearley end his dispute with the Lancashire committee and bowl superbly before business kept him out of most of the August matches. He took 148 wickets in just 17 matches and was named a Cricketer of the Year by Wisden. In 1909 he was even more impressive so long as he could play, but failed in his only Test against Australia at Leeds in 1909, and in the following two years business and a major accident limited him to playing just 14 of Lancashire’s 58 Championship games.

The following year, Brearley’s rift with the Lancashire committee became irreconcilable and at the beginning of 1912 it was clear he would play no County cricket. However, so well thought of was he that, playing when business allowed for Cheshire in the Minor Counties competition, Brearley played his fourth and final Test for England against South Africa at Lord’s in June, but the wicket was too soft for him to get a foothold.

Even when the best fast bowler in the world, Brearley could never go on an overseas tour owing to business commitments.

Brearley made one final first class appearance in 1921 at the age of 45 when he was picked for Archie MacLaren’s amateur team that took on, and beat, Warwick Armstrong’s previously invincible Australians. Brearley’s own contribution was modest: he scored one run and did not bowl.

A wholehearted cricketer who bustled about whatever he did, Brearley’s batting fame rested on his hurried walk to the wicket and the much-told Old Trafford story that, at the sound of him scurrying to the wicket, the horse walked between the shafts of the heavy roller ready for the end of the innings. Altogether for Lancashire he took 690 wickets at a cost of 18 runs apiece. In all cricket, he took 844 wickets in 134 first class matches at an average of 19.31, with a best performance of 9-47. He took ten wickets in a match an impressive 27 times, with 93 five wicket innings. With the bat scored only 908 runs at an average of 5.89 with a high score of 38. Of his batting, Neville Cardus wrote “Every ball was a crisis as far as Brealey was concerned”.