Bob Appleyard, born 27 June 1924, was widely acknowledged as one of the greatest bowlers of his day. If health had not let him down and his life had not been buffeted by tragedies, he might have had figures to underline the same. Arunabha Sengupta looks back at the Yorkshire bowler who captured 200 wickets in his first full season and won a battle against tuberculosis.
“Who’s Bob Appleyard?”
The 1987-88 season in Australia coincided with the country’s bicentennial celebrations. And to commemorate the occasion their arch rivals agreed to fly over and play a solitary Test match at Sydney. The Ashes urn was carried over by none other than Prince Charles himself.
The Test match was a rather tedious affair, with the young, stumbling Australian side struggling to hold on for a draw in a game marred by interruptions due to bad light and a petulant Chris Broad flattening his stumps in a childish show of rancour after being dismissed.
Far more interesting was the other ‘Test’ match contested for the occasion. It was an initiative of the Gestetner Company, played on the computer, between English and Australian teams chosen over the ages. All Time XIs with the caveat that all cricketers would have to be alive. In other words, it was a cricket match between living legends.
It was indeed a fascinating contest, perhaps rendered close because Don Bradman was caught by Ian Botham off Harold Larwood for just eight in the first innings. Len Hutton eased his way to a serene century in response, but all the England players knew that the great Australian would make the English pay in the second innings. Indeed, Bradman scored his mandatory hundred when he walked out to bat again in the world of pixels and England were left 287 to win. Denis Compton hit a thrilling 65, but in came Bill O’Reilly towards the late stages, picking up six second-innings wickets and clinching a win for the Aussies by 37 runs.
As many as 14 of the living legends who faced each other on the computer simulated arena turned up at the Sydney Cricket Ground. The score of the computer Test was intermittently announced to the spectators. On the second day, during the lunch interval, as Hutton was getting to his hundred in the virtual world, the 14 assembled behind the Bradman Stand. Each of the great cricketers got into a vintage car for a parade around the outfield.
Bradman led the way in a 1911 Rolls Royce, Arthur Morris followed in a 1909 Delage. Then there was Geoff Boycott in a cream coloured suit and his characteristic Panama hat, getting into a 1905 Rover. After a few sputtering yards, the car broke down, and Boycott, suit and all, had to step out and push it to the side. The Yorkshireman had to complete his journey in Neil Harvey’s vehicle.
There were, of course, more Yorkshiremen in the side other than Hutton and Boycott — can one dream of an All-Time England XI without a bunch of them? The team had been handpicked by Len Hutton, Ian Botham and Colin Cowdrey, three greats spanning three periods of English cricket that stretched across living memory. And as for Yorkshire stalwarts, there was Fred Trueman of course, sharing new ball with Larwood. And along with him, the three selectors plumped for that curious bowler who mixed pace and spin as no one had ever done since the pre-World War One days of Syd Barnes.
According to Colin Cowdrey, “He possessed astonishing accuracy, bowling from a great height. A slow medium off-cutter was his stock ball, interspersed with a seamer, an away-swinger, and, by way of contrast, a genuinely spun slow off-spinner. And he could throw in a lethal yorker. He pursued each batsman’s weakness with a tenacity and zeal all his own. Bob Appleyard, in the short period that health allowed him to play for England, was able to demonstrate without doubt that he was one of the greatest bowlers that there has been.”
In the Computer Test, Appleyard removed Neil Harvey and Greg Chappell. And on the Sydney Cricket Ground he was there, a dapper 63 year-old, boarding a 1911 Star to be wheeled around the ground.
Jim Laker had passed away in the April of 1986. However, Appleyard had been chosen over living legends of the repute of Tony Lock, Derek Underwood, Fred Titmus and Ray Illingworth.
Not everyone knew him. Not everyone do now either. Not everyone did in the interim.
He had been a key member of that famed 1954-55 team led by Len Hutton, when Frank Tyson had blown the Australian batsmen away and England had won the Ashes for the first time since the Bodyline Odyssey of 1932-33. There had been 12 players who played for England in the Tests that series. Eleven of them wrote autobiographies, some multiple times. Ten of them had full-length biographies written about them. There were 14 accounts of the tour by the following summer itself. Margaret Hughes wrote one classic of cricket, and Alan Ross another; plenty of others produced plenty of varying viewpoint and quality.
The one man who did not write his autobiography was Bob Appleyard. Few even realised that in spite of the heroism of Tyson, the steady support of Brian Statham, the back-of-the-hand experimental Chinamen bowled with great success by Johnny Wardle, it was actually Appleyard who had topped the bowling averages on that tour. And he had done so in spite of not having dismissed even one tail-ender. Yes, all his wickets were of top order batsmen. The least accomplished man with the willow whom he scalped was Richie Benaud.
I remember when I first read the account of the computer Test of January 1988, in one of the niche cricket magazines available at that time. I recognised all the names in the two sides, except one. I remember myself wondering, “Who is this Appleyard bowling to Bradman?” Now I know that I was not alone. In the 1990s, when Derek Hodgson of The Independent met Jack Sokell of the Wombwell Cricket Lovers’ Society and they decided to do something about the unwritten story, the synopsis was sent to publishers. Few were encouraging. And some even asked, “Who is Bob Appleyard?”
A tragedy, really.
Not only because Bob Appleyard was a great, great bowler. That he was. Trueman, whenever he attended an evening where his former teammate turned up, never tired of pointing out to all and sundry, “Remember, this man here was one of the greatest of bowlers of all time.”
Not only because he made a late debut in First-Class cricket and captured 200 wickets in his first full season. Not only because he topped averages in Australia. Not only because in his very short career his 708 wickets came at 15.48, an average bettered only by Hedley Verity among those with more than 200 wickets since the First World War. Not only because his Test match bowling average of 17.87 has been bettered by only Mike Procter among those with 30 wickets or more since the First World War.
It is because every publisher should have known that the life of Bob Appleyard contained the most remarkable of stories. No cricketer, perhaps no sportsman, has ever reached those dizzy heights of success after going through the travails and tragedies in life that Appleyard did. His is a tale of hardship and battle, with life and death, and a romance like no other. It is a pity that he did not write his autobiography and for nearly half a century there thus remained a huge void in the cricket world.
And finally, in 2003, the story was told. Derek Hodgson had started it, and it was finished by that wizard of county cricket chronicling, Stephen Chalke.
The writer and his 79-year-old subject sat deciding the title of the book. They first thought of A Lad’s Game because that’s what cricket was to Appleyard. And then they discussed Seventy Nine Not Out, along the lines of Seventy One Not Out by William Caffyn. There was a while during which they discussed A Bloody-Minded Yorkshireman. That would have suited Appleyard perfectly.
However, then Appleyard thought of Emily Bronte, that sterling Yorkshirewoman, the author of Wuthering Heights. The lady who had created Heathcliff had contracted tuberculosis in the days when there was no cure. She had written these lines, because people of that era found their hope in religion: “No coward soul is mine, No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere; I see Heaven’s glories shine, And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.”
Hence, the book was called No Coward Soul. Appleyard had played much of his cricket with the undiagnosed tuberculosis infested in and gnawing away at his lung. For two years he had tussled with death and despair, at mercy of fate and physicians. And he had returned to conquer county cricket and taste success in Tests after losing half a lung.
And he lost much more along the way.
As already mentioned, his is a remarkable story.
Cricket and calamity
Appleyard was born in Bradford on June 27, 1924. And it was at Bradford that he played in the famed league that was for long the refuge of cricket starved souls during the years of War and conflict.
But all that came later. Appleyard’s journey was seldom a jaunt, more often a series of tantalising trips to the brink of the final fall. It started early.
His father was a railwayman, and his mother left them when he was seven. It was a setback, but there was something to fall back on. It was the same year that he got his first cricket bat, of Indian make with the picture of an elephant on the front. Few kids had their own bats, and it made him feel special.
By the time he was ten, Appleyard was playing for his junior school team. That summer, in 1934, his teacher took the school team boys across to Headingley, Leeds, to see England play Australia. They sat on the grass and watched Bradman and Bill Ponsford add 388 during the day, with the England bowlers toiling away without success.
It is a miracle that Appleyard chose to be a bowler after this experience, and that is what he confided to The Don when he met the legend in Australia down the years.
He moved to Priestman Central for specialist and commercial training, and a lot of the summer days were spent watching Hedley Verity, Bill Bowes, Herbert Sutcliffe, Maurice Leyland and a young Len Hutton at the nearby Park Avenue ground.
It was during this time, as a 14-year-old, that Appleyard changed his role from a batsman to a major wicket-taking bowler in the Bradford School team. He also played football for junior school, alongside boys who went on to become reputed footballers in later years — including William Deplidge, William Elliott and also Len Shackleton. His sporting endeavours also extended to his being one of the ball boys at a Tennis match at Odsal stadium involving Bill Tilden, Donald Budge, Lester Stoeffen and Ellsworth Vines.
And alongside cricket, the saga of tragedies launched itself in Appleyard’s life. In 1937, his sister Margaret died from diphtheria. By then, however, his father had remarried, and there was an extended family to fall back on for spiritual sustenance.
It was in the following year that he was invited to the Headingley for Easter coaching sessions supervised by the great George Hirst. And he also went to the Bradford club at Park Avenue, playing in the third and second elevens.
But, his promising rise in the great Yorkshire bowling tradition was halted by Hitler. And perhaps it was the shadow of War that made his father take that extreme step that would leave a life-long scar on the psyche of the young boy. Or perhaps it was an accident.
He was at school, working his way towards being a draughtsman. Several of his nights were spent at his grandmother’s place. Two days after Neville Chamberlain’s declaration of War, he walked back to his house from his grandmother’s, only to find his whole family — father, stepmother and two baby step sisters — gassed in their home.
A devastated Bob was taken in by his stepmother’s parents Billy and Emma Child. And it was mostly due to the influence of this devoutly religious family that in him was instilled the faith that would help him to battle through many of life’s otherwise insurmountable obstacles.
Appleyard started working, first for the machine shop at Hepworth and Grandage, and then as an apprentice in engineering at Knoles and Company.
Tragedies continued. He looked up at Norman Child, son of Billy and Emma, as his role model. Norman, a policeman, was now a pilot in the Coastal Command, flying out of Wick. Appleyard himself wanted to be a pilot, following Norman’s footsteps.
On May 1, 1941, Flight-Sergeant Norman Child was killed due to fog and a failed engine.
A distraught Appleyard joined Air Training Corps. He also played for Manningham Mills in the Bradford Central League. Later, a colleague at Air Training Corps introduced him to Bowling Old Lane. It was the first cricketing home that he was blessed to find.
Club and County, Pace and Spin
The Saturday afternoons saw some fascinating cricket. Appleyard bowled to men like Learie Constantine and Les Ames, Eddie Paynter and George Pope; and, when they happened to be on leave, Herbert Sutcliffe and Len Hutton.
When he turned 18, Appleyard was accepted as Pilot-Navigator-Bomb-aimer. However, there was not much to do as the War drew to an end. The Navy rejected him because he was earmarked for RAF. The only productive period for the young man was in his office or on the cricket field in the Bradford League.
During this period, clothing was rationed and sports attire was not being manufactured. Cycling to work one day, he saw a pair of second hand flannels displayed for sale. On his way back, he bought them. They fitted perfectly. And moreover, inside the label read ‘H. Verity.’ Appleyard had never been prouder.
Eventually he was accepted in the navy as specialist engineer for ship repair. He travelled and played some cricket, in Dartmouth, Colombo and Cyprus. But, he was low in hierarchy and cricket in the forces was governed by rank rather than skill. He often did not get a match, or a bowl.
It was on the way back from Colombo that a precautionary x-ray showed a spot on his lung. In hindsight, that was probably the start of his tubercular infection. However, it remained undetected for another six years.
For the next few seasons Appleyard worked as a salesman and was one of the many trundlers, the many seamers of the Bradford League. “He was just another seamer, there were plenty like him,” summed up Norman Horner.
In 1950, when he was finally called up for the county side, he finished 22nd in the League Averages. Few thought he had extraordinary talent, and that included himself. Yet, he had hope. And he had the amazing ability to raise his game whenever the challenge became more pronounced.
Playing for the first time in the county second eleven, at the rather advanced age of 26, he finished with 4 for 29 from 24 overs. The following week he played at Knypersley against Staffordshire, and for the first time mixed seam with spin after running in sixteen paces. His first innings figures read 7 for 41, all bowled. And in the second he took 8 for 21.
He had done enough to merit a place in the county side. His First-Class debut was in a friendly against Scotland and he captured five for 41. And that was his ticket to more serious cricket, opening the bowling against Surrey at The Oval. He got his first wicket with a field set for outswing and by slipping in an off-break. He finished with 4 for 47, including Peter May for a duck.
For the rest of the game, and much of the outing against Gloucestershire, the last match he played that season, Appleyard did not have much of a role as captain Norman Yardley relied on spin. He spent his time in the outfield, thinking deep thoughts about how he could be in the action, bowling all the time. It was at that moment that the idea of mixing spin with pace was born. That winter he spent his days at Headingley’s Winter Shed, perfecting his off-spinner and leg-cutter, so that he could go on bowling regardless of the state of the pitch or conditions.
At the end of the first season, he was listed in the Playfair Cricket Annual as a right-arm medium-pacer. By the time he was done with the batsmen in the next few seasons, he was classified more often than not as an off-spinner. He could not be categorised. That is what made him special.
The summer of 200
The summer of 1951 was the first full season played by Appleyard. And he took 200 First-Class wickets, the only bowler ever to do so in his first full season, and perhaps the only bowler who will ever manage the feat.
Overall seven bowlers have taken 200 in an English summer, only three since World War Two. Alf Gover is the only other to have bowled off a long run-up. The rest were slow spinners.
By then, the series of tragedies had stemmed to a halt. Appleyard had found employment in Short’s Lifts, an association that would last a while. And that spring he had got married to Connie Ledgard whom he had met at the Bradford Dance Club.
The evenings he spent at the Winter Shed, he commuted in his mother-in-law’s Wolesley. Often he gave rides to the coaches Emmott Robinson and Arthur Mitchell. And the journeys would be spent discussing cricket all the way.
It was also at the Winter Shed that Yorkshire skipper Yardley saw his off-breaks and was interested enough to encourage him.
And then his spinning finger developed a blister. Appleyard had no intention of stopping his training, and hence started spinning the ball off the middle finger. This enabled him to bowl the off-spinner much quicker, and he did not lose accuracy even a wee bit. “If you can bowl like that, you can bowl any bugger out,” said Arthur Mitchell.
When the season started, he was well-nigh unplayable. Starting with four for 26 against Oxford University, he moved on to 6 for 38 against the visiting South Africans. Against Gloucestershire, he suffered from diarrhoea, and Arthur Mitchell gave him a brownish liquid. Later he came to know that the mixture had been concocted out of port and brandy. Appleyard was a teetotaller. His figures transformed themselves from 2 for 81 to 7 for 84.
Wickets were obtained by the bushel. Batsmen did not know how to play him. Harold Gimblett’s genius had no answer. At Taunton, Appleyard was given the ball, and Gimblett muttered, “Oh, that’s buggered it.” Then the West County stalwart fell to a long hop. Appleyard was not only successful; he had gripped the hearts of batsmen in the cold grasp of fear. By this time he had also developed a fast leg-cutter that pitched on the leg-stump and zipped back to hit off and middle.
But in the midst of all this success were warning signals. In the midst of a ten-wicket haul against Surrey, Appleyard made a ball stop on skipper Michael Barton and got him to push a catch back at him. As he walked back Barton wondered about Appleyard’s complexion. “That is the sort of pastiness that tubercular people have.” Barton had grown up in Liverpool, where death by consumption was rampant. Tuberculosis was always around in the consciousness of Englishmen. The previous year, George Orwell had died of the disease.
When the Yorkshiremen took on the South Africans at Bramall Lane, Appleyard drove home with a temperature of 103. An inebriated locum, with breath stinking of whiskey, visited him at his home and told him that he had pleurisy. He gave the bowler a cough mixture.
So, once the temperature went down, Appleyard returned. When he took 6 for 17 against Essex, Yardley called him and Trueman and presented their caps. The Yorkshire bowling attack included Trueman and Wardle, but Appleyard was leading them by miles. According to Wardle, he bowled at times like Alec Bedser and at others like Jim Laker.
He began the season’s final match against MCC at Scarborough, a festival game, with 189 wickets under his belt. And he claimed his 11th scalp when Roy Tattersall was caught at mid-on by Trueman. He had bowled 1323.2 overs and had exactly 200 wickets at 14.14. The thousands of Yorkshire supporters who had been flocking to the grounds day after day anticipating the feat now rejoiced in their hero. A telegram arrived from Wilfred Rhodes, a letter from George Hirst.
Along with it he was named one of the five cricketers of the year by Wisden.
Beneath those handsome, rugged looks lay Bob Appleyard’s tale of agony © Getty Images
The shadow of death
There was some talk about his going to India to join the English team as a replacement of ‘Dusty’ Rhodes. However, Eddie Leadbeater was sent because Nigel Howard wanted a leg-spinner. Given the advanced stage of tuberculosis at that juncture, it was lucky that Appleyard did not go all the way to that climate of heat and dust.
In 1952, he bowled at Taunton. He had stayed in the dressing room for long, coughing incessantly, his limbs seeped in fatigue. In the late afternoon, he bowled 16 overs. He got back to the hotel with a high temperature, coughing his lungs out. Teammate Frank Lowson called a doctor who asked him to see a specialist. Appleyard drove back to Bradford, 270 miles through the rain.
The Yorkshire President, TL Taylor, sent him to the Leeds General Infirmary. He was examined by thoracic surgeon Geoffrey Wooler.
His wife was pregnant, sitting in the hospital, holding his hands. His career was hanging in balance. In 1954, the Daily Express published Appleyard’s own words about the predicament:
“Slowly the specialist said: ‘You have tuberculin infection, but it’s nothing we cannot cope with…’ This was grim… He went on, ‘I may have to do a little surgery, but please, you will help us both if you don’t worry: that is the most important thing you can do for yourself.’”
The doctor assured Connie Appleyard that no child was born with tuberculosis. And then, with his arm round his wife, the leading Yorkshire bowler asked his doctor the burning question:
“My next concern was for my future… all that I had planned for, in Yorkshire cricket. Were my playing days over? Slowly, the surgeon said, ‘You will play again, Mr Appleyard. In fact, I shall come to Headingley to watch you bowl.’
“The surgeon’s promise gave me faith. And fear was moving out to make room for it.”
Appleyard was admitted in the TB ward at Killingbeck Hospital, Leeds. He lay on his back for five months. A daughter was born during his first month in the premises, and a newspaper photographer gave him three enlargements of photographs of his wife and the newborn. There was also a small lock of hair his wife had snipped from the baby’s head.
As he lay in the hospital, less than five miles away Trueman destroyed the Indians as he made his sensational Test debut. Shortly afterwards, the Wisden cricketer of the previous year was taken on a stretcher to an ambulance and was driven away to the Gateforth sanatorium.
There, Connie brought him a cricket ball. Appleyard kept it under the bedclothes and worked his fingers against it, to preserve the hardness of skin.
Appleyard passed the summer waiting to recover. Lorna Smart, an Admiralty Statistician and cricket fan, wrote him letters describing the matches with rigour and numerical detail. Her letters were almost as comprehensive and accurate as the graphic analysis carried out today on television.
In the meantime, as the operation drew near, Appleyard discovered strength and solace in yoga. He became involved with meditation, and it was a composed young man who was transferred to Pinderfields Hospital in Wakefield. The faith instilled by the Childs helped him to stand strong against the perils of fate.
In 1952, medical science had just about learnt how to remove the disease surgically. Geoffrey Wooler started the operation. The upper lobe of the left lung was removed completely. Luckily the lower lobe was saved. Appleyard came out with a reduced lung capacity, but a heart full of hope. A scar from the armpit to the waist would remind him of the primitive needlework performed to stitch up the operation.
Yorkshire forever: from left — Bob Appleyard, Brian Close, Johnny Wardle and Fred Trueman © Getty Images
Walk, run, bowl
Yardley visited the following day. However, not many felt Appleyard could play again. It was a distant goal. First, after months on his back, he would have to find ways of learning to walk again.
‘No baby was ever so willing,’ Appleyard recalled. He was given a putter and a golf-ball, and asked to make the ball creep along a green course. No swings were allowed.
Next came the scary process of crossing the road. Slowly he started visiting the physiotherapist, working on his action. He started swimming at the Bingley Baths, picking the brains of the superintendent Jim Wright, former physiotherapist of Bill Bowes and Hedley Verity. He kept working on his fitness by putting on the greens, advancing to chips and swings.
He spent the summer of 1953 desperate to get back into action. But, while playing the game was not possible, Appleyard sat watching the matches at Bradford, noting the shortcomings of the batsmen, committing their batting styles to memory.
That September, he walked around the boundary, attending a match at Bradford. And a ball from the nets rolled towards him. He bent down, picked it up and bowled it back. It pitched on perfect length. Appleyard was elated. He had not lost any of his accuracy.
By the beginning of next year, he had rejoined his employment with Short’s Lifts and his wife had presented him with a second daughter. Now all that remained was to get back to cricket.
There were adjustments to be made. His lung capacity had dropped. So, he focused on conserving energy. His spin was once again imparted from forefinger instead of the middle because it consumed much less effort. He still ran in from sixteen paces, but was not as quick. He developed the loop ball, the one that came out before the hand reached full height. The new ball was still effective in his hands, but he became much more reliant on the subtleties of spin.
The Yorkshire committee sent him to Switzerland, for a month in Arosa, at a winter sports centre. The expenses were all paid with the condition that he would not ski. However, he almost met a fatal accident trying to ride a temperamental horse.
As the summer of 1954 began, Yorkshire Post remained rather subdued in their optimism. “The attack will be strengthened by the return of Trueman after National Service, (Brian) Close and maybe Appleyard for some games.”
The second coming
The first match was at Lord’s, against MCC. Appleyard bowled in tandem with Wardle. He dropped it short; Bill Edrich hooked, wafting the arms without the swivel. At square leg, young Ray Illingworth held a brilliant ankle-high catch. Norman Yardley shouted, “Well done, only 199 to go.”
The first match yielded two for 45 from 19 overs. It was a steady start. And for the third match he played that season, the team travelled to Taunton. It was here that he had been taken ill two years earlier. All emotions hastened to return. The first innings saw the return of Appleyard the master bowler, figures of 29.2-7-72-5. The second saw the return of the destroyer: Somerset collapsed from 22 for 2 to 48 all out; Appleyard’s bowling figures read 9.3-3-16-7.
The following match at Park Avenue saw him destroy Hampshire with 7 for 35.
Appleyard was back and bowling like the devil.
There was only one disappointment. The match between the Roses rivals at Headingley was rained off after the first day. Lancashire did not bat and Appleyard did not bowl. Hence, surgeon Geoffrey Wooler, who had turned up as promised, did not get to see his patient in action.
On his 30th birthday, June 27, 1954, Appleyard received the best present for a cricketer — inclusion in the England side. It was for the Test against Pakistan at Trent Bridge. It had not only been a fairy tale comeback for him, it had been a reservoir of hope for many, many tuberculosis patients to sustain themselves.
A man wrote from Acton: “Remember every wicket you take every catch every run on the scoreboard makes dozens of people now in hospital think: ‘Well, if he can do it, so can I.’” Another boy sent the note from Huddersfield, “Watching you running about the field has inspired us in the hope that my father will soon be up and about.”
An old Yorkshireman declared, “May England be represented by men who will never acknowledge defeat, men like Bob Appleyard.”
David Sheppard was the stand in captain during the Test match. And he rated Appleyard very, very highly. “Had Bob stayed fit, would Jim got back in the England side?” the Reverend asked later. Yes, there are conjectures about the respective fates of Laker and Appleyard had the latter’s health held good and it was he who had run in at Manchester in the summer of 1956.
The Wednesday before the Test match witnessed total eclipse of the sun. Hence, headlines were rife about Appleyard eclipsing the Pakistan batting the following day. The visitors, choosing to bat first, had moved to 37 for 1, when Sheppard waved towards third-man and Appleyard trotted up to send down his first over in Test cricket.
It was a tale eked out of schoolboy fiction. The second ball seemed to move away, and Hanif moved across to play it. And it darted back to hit him in front of the stumps. In the third over Maqsood Ahmed was caught off a ball that moved away off the seam. In his fourth, Waqar Hassan was bowled by a fast yorker. And in the fifth, Imtiaz Ahmed was bowled by a quicker one which spun sharply from the off.
The pitch was firm, true, on which Denis Compton would wreak havoc the following day. And Appleyard, with the first 27 balls of his career, had accounted for 4 Pakistani top-order batsmen.
He finished with 5 for 51, and then Compton rolled back the years with a spectacular knock of 278.
Pakistan were crushed. Appleyard did not play any more in the series, other bowlers were tried out. However, the selectors had seen enough. A letter reached Dr Wooler. John Nash, the Yorkshire secretary, had asked on behalf of the MCC whether Appleyard could stand up to the demands of six and a half months in Australia.
Wooler replied in the affirmative. Chalke writes, “Perhaps today, with doctors frightened away from risk by the fear of litigation, the decision might be different.”
Appleyard did not complete 200 wickets that year. He finished with 154 at 14.42, highest in terms of tally, wedged in the averages between Statham and Peter Loader. He had bowled 1027.3 overs without half of his left lung.
The soldier and his general: Bob Appleyard (extreme left) and Len Hutton (extreme right) just before the 1954-55 tour. John Wilson is in between © Getty Images
On Top Down Under
Yet, his selection for Australia was not viewed with favour by all. The choice of Wardle and Appleyard as the two spinners — both Yorkshiremen — had not really amused the journalists of Southern England. EM Wellings was especially brutal in his criticism.
Things did not help when in Ceylon, where the SS Orsova had docked for a match, an overenthusiastic youth ran into the ground and collided with Appleyard, thus ramming into his left ribs. Those were the same ribs that had been operated on, and when he asked for x-rays, Wellings wrote, “Appleyard seemed to be worrying himself into a mental state that was anything but conducive to good cricket.” Journalists have forever talked through the wrong end.
Ultimately a proper x-ray was done and a crack was found. Radiographers were more interested in his lungs, as his case had made rounds in a medical journal. Appleyard missed the first matches.
When he returned at Adelaide, the South Australians chased 174 for victory and were on 142 for 5. Appleyard had given away 40 off 8 overs till then. Now, reintroduced into the attack by Hutton, he captured 4 wickets in 3 overs to clinch a close win.
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England lost the first Test at Brisbane where four pace bowlers were tried out. When Appleyard was chosen ahead of Bedser in the second at Sydney, Wellings wrote, “Three cheers were called for and joyously given in the Australian dressing room.” The bowler himself had no time for such reports. He was busy recording his Christmas greetings on a vinyl disc to be posted to his family back in Thornton.
The major contribution of Appleyard in his first Australian Test was more with the bat. In the second innings, England were 250 for 9 when he was joined by Statham, with the lead only 176. They added 46 and Appleyard stayed unbeaten on 19, his highest Test score.
Australia needed 223 for victory. The second Australian innings was all Tyson, and some Statham, with Appleyard chipping in with the wicket of Benaud. But the important thing was parity had been restored in the series, and the Yorkshireman had played a definite role. The margin of victory was 38 runs, 8 less than what the last wicket had put on.
In the following Test at Melbourne, Appleyard removed Harvey in his first over, with a ball that pitched on the leg and hit off. A while later, Benaud pushed helplessly into the hands of Vic Wilson lurking in short leg. In the thrilling stages of Australia’s second innings, Les Favell moved out to drive, was beaten by the dip and was bowled.
Even Wellings, who still considered the Yorkshire bowler extremely lucky, was forced to write that it was ‘pleasant to record the measure of success achieved by Appleyard.’ England were 2-1 up and Appleyard had proved the ideal foil for the battering rams in Tyson and Statham.
And then came Adelaide. On the first day, Colin McDonald was too early into his stroke to a slower one and was caught at short leg. That evening, with Australia on 161 for 4, Appleyard and Cowdrey visited Bradman at his residence. Whether he was helped by some insights or not remains debatable, but the following morning he accounted for Benaud and Keith Miller. And after the brilliant bowling, he muffed up an easy run out chance to allow the tail-enders put on a substantial partnership.
However, he made up for it in the second innings. Statham and Tyson had been unable to break through. Appleyard came on and induced Morris to hit his first ball back to him. Burke and Harvey surrendered their wickets as well, unable to cope with infinite variations embossed in deadly accuracy.
The next day was again all about Tyson and Statham, but Appleyard had enjoyed his best Test so far, six top-order Australian batsmen.
At the end of the series, Tyson led the tally by far, 28 wickets at 20.82, Statham had 18 at 27.72. But, in terms of averages, Appleyard had 11 scalps at 20.36. And his economy of 2.12 was superior to any other. He was acknowledged as an asset on the tour.
As a glittering footnote to that tour, England dismissed New Zealand for 26 in the second innings at Auckland, thus inflicting an innings defeat after procuring a lead of just 46. Appleyard’s figures read 3 for 38 in the first innings, and 6-3-7-4 in the second (where New Zealand were bowled out for 26). If Alex Moir’s tentative prod had not fallen just short of Tom Graveney, he might have had a hat-trick as well.
The decline
The next season started full of grand expectations. At Bradford, Northamptonshire’s resident Aussie George Tribe picked up 15 for 75. And then he finished on the losing side, with Appleyard claiming 11 for 48, and Wardle 7 for 38.
Against arch-rivals Surrey, in the happy hunting grounds of Laker and Lock, Appleyard decimated the home side for 85 with figures of 7 for 29. His description of his excellent bowling to a battalion of pressmen was simply, “It was wet.” However, Laker, Lock, Loader and Bedser shot back and the hosts won a fascinating game.
By the time of the first Test he had taken 71 wickets in less than six weeks. His career record stood at 481 wickets at 13.91 apiece. No bowler since the First World War had managed such an average.
But then the problems started. His shoulder acted up at Trent Bridge during the Test against South Africa. Two wickets did come in the first innings, but none in the second. The pain did not subside. There followed a series of secondary injuries.
Eventually a neurologist called Hugh Garland discovered a nerve trapped in a small orifice in his shoulder blade. He ended the season at the head of the table yet again, averaging just 13.01 for his 85 wickets. But he struggled with his shoulder.
The 1956 season brought 112 wickets at 17.25; not only Laker but also Illingworth had gone past him. His Test at Trent Bridge against the Australians was not really remarkable. He shared the new ball with Trevor Bailey, and when he felt he should switch to spin, May called for Laker. That was the last time he played for England.
Soon, the hero of England was fighting to get into the Yorkshire side. Indeed, his bowling was never the same again. His body rebelled, his injuries spanned his feet, his toes, his arm. He had always been a fighter who never gave an inch. As he made his way to the Second XI matches, the body refusing but the spirit egging him on, his obstinacy came to the fore more often than his determination. He could be churlish when he was removed from the attack, or catches were dropped off him.
The new generation of cricketers, who had not served in the War and had not grown up during The Depression, did not quite identify or find enough reasons to accept this behaviour. Complaints were lodged, many of them justified.
There were men who wanted to help him. There were efforts to allow him to get over his physical ailments if possible. But, ultimately, he got a letter from Nash, the Yorkshire Secretary, informing him that his services were no longer needed.
His final figures read 708 wickets in 152 matches at 15.48. In Tests, his 7 outings got him 31 scalps at 17.87.
Beyond the game
Appleyard continued to work for Short’s Lifts, and later, through his cricketing connections, joined John Waddington Limited. However, tragedy continued the lifelong association. After his two daughters, a son had been born. Young Ian Appleyard died of leukaemia in 1960.
Absorbing yet another blow, Appleyard moved on and became a successful sales manager. The family also moved to Ilkley where he stayed till his last days.
A few good Yorkshiremen: Bob Appleyard is seated to the right of Ray Illingworth; standing, from left to right, are Andrew Gale, Dickie Bird, Brian Close, and Geoff Boycott
From Waddington he moved to British Printing Corporation as Sales Development Manager. In the early 1980s he locked horns in a long legal battle with the unscrupulous Robert Maxwell of the British Printing Corporation. However, he was proud of what Maxwell said about him, “I know that Appleyard. He’s a bloody-minded Yorkshireman. He’ll take me all the way.”
He later joined ICI Fibres as a consultant.
The blows of fortune continued. Daughter Rosemarie’s marriage broke up and the younger of her two boys died, once again of leukaemia. The Appleyard family became the pivotal members of the Ilkley Candlelighters, an association for raising funds against the deadly disease.
Appleyard served some days in the Yorkshire cricket committee and was keenly associated with the cricket Academy. When the Academy began in 1989, he communicated with his contacts in Australia, and it lead to player swaps. From South Australia, 19-year-old Craig White, originally from Morley, Leeds, came over to play for Yorkshire.
Later he became President of Yorkshire County Cricket Club.
Till his last days Appleyard was intent in watching modern-day cricket, figuring out how he would have bowled to people like Adam Gilchrist and Brian Lara. He could talk about Bradman and Ponsford and switch to T20 without any of the old timer’s baggage where the past hoards all the glory that ever was.
One of his fascinating pastimes was also to find out about his mother’s maiden name, Swithenbank, which was shared by the ancestry of Len Hutton. Not much connection could be detected, but Appleyard discovered to his horror that he was one quarter Lancastrian.
And he was meticulous about every aspect of his life. Biographer Chalke received a phone call about his work in progress from Appleyard’s friend Ron Deaton. “On page 35, in the description of Bertie Buse’s bowling, you’ve got the line ‘The trick is to get it swinging in the last yard.’ Bob wants to change that to ‘the last couple of yards.’”
A bemused Chalke replied that he had assumed it was just a turn of phrase.
“You’ve no idea,” replied Deaton. “We spent 20 minutes on the floor with tape measure.”
That was Appleyard all right — scrupulous, scientific, analytical and perfectionist. A great bowler who could have been far greater if health had permitted, but then perhaps an epic tale of resilience would have been left unlived and untold.
Appleyard passed away at Harrogate on March 17, 2015 — but not before life had inflicted another major blow on him. Just like his son, John, leukaemia claimed his grandson Ian as well.