Brief Candles 2: More One-Match Wonders

Book excerpt: This second volume of ‘Brief Candles’ once again looks at the lives, in and out of cricket, of a batch of players who flickered only briefly on the first-class scene. Most earn their inclusion because of an unusual achievement that they recorded during their brief careers at that level. So you can read here about the five cricketers who played an innings in the 90s in their debut game, and the five who shared in century partnerships on debut when batting at number 11 - and yet none of them was ever picked again. Others are included because of something that happened to them during their one-and-only first-class matches - like the three cricketers who were no-balled for throwing on their debuts, whereupon they disappeared from the first-class game altogether. Another two earn their appearance because of a pair of unhappy coincidences: though unrelated they shared the same unusual surname, and both met their deaths in the most tragic of circumstances. And finally there’s the clergyman who played his only first-class match when just six months short of his 60th birthday. Brief Candles 2 explores the lives of these and some others who deserve to be better remembered for their unusual, if very short, contributions to the history of the first-class game.