by Mayukh Ghosh
Local Heroes – The Story of the Derbyshire team which won the County Championship by John Shawcroft
Derbyshire’s triumph in the 1936 County Championship is perhaps the unlikeliest among them all.
They were unfashionable. Not many paid attentions to the team of miners and the leading cricket writers never bothered following their fortunes.
They had nearly folded in 1910 and had the worst possible campaign in 1920. Even in 1924, they found themselves at the rock bottom.
Then the General Strike of 1926 changed things for them. Two of their best, Tommy Mitchell and Bill Copson, owed much of their progress in cricket to the 1926 strike.
Ten years later, they were at the top. Not a fluke as they made steady progress throughout the 1930s.
TCF Prittie summed up their effort: “A victory of perseverance, determination and dependability….guts and keenness.”
No wonder the subject was a dream one for a Derbyshire cricket historian. No one better than John Shawcroft and he gladly took it up.
He explains his motivation:
“Since boyhood I had always been fascinated by the stories of Derbyshire’s team which won the County Championship in 1936, having finished runners-up in 1935 and in the top three from 1934-37.
“As a youngster I saw many of that team play in the immediate post-war seasons, although they were obviously past their best, and in later years I enjoyed talks with several players, notably Tommy Mitchell, Denis Smith, Alf Pope, Alan Skinner, Charlie Elliott and the secretary Will Taylor.
“They broke the mould, ending the monopoly of the Big Six, and what made it more exceptional was that the team was almost entirely home-grown. Most came from the coalfields that straddle the Derbyshire-Nottinghamshire border, an area which also produced Harold Larwood and Bill Voce of Notts. Also, in 1920, Derbyshire nearly went out of business having losing 17 of their 18 matches, the other being abandoned without a ball being bowled, so it was some rise. Most of the players came through the club’s Nursery, run by the coach Sam Cadman, a former county allrounder.”
When he got a chance to explore the triumph in detail, he had no hesitation in going ahead with the project.
“The idea for a book on what was effectively a team of coal miners rising to such heights led to interest from by Randall Northam of SportsBooks, who had faith in the venture and went ahead with publication. We met for lunch in the Midland Hotel near Derby’s railway station, for the initial discussion.
“Apart from my love of cricket it helped that I grew up in what was then the Derbyshire coalfield – the mines have long gone now – so the book became something of a social history about the county in those days. My dad, who was a miner, knew Harry Storer from boyhood and I also remember him chatting to Bill Copson on the boundary edge during a lull in play. They were talking about the merits of various coal seams when I dearly wanted him to ask Copson about the methods of bowling to Bradman, Hutton or Compton!”
The book did well and received wide critical acclaim.
“The book was very well received, and I suppose it is probably the best of my work, although I’m the first to admit that I had a cracking subject. It still surfaces and only last season a former Derbyshire player from the 1970s said he had obtained a copy and thoroughly enjoyed it. Receiving such comments from a player who knows the game inside out is very satisfying.
“Derbyshire could well win the Championship again, but it will never be under such circumstances, indeed it is unlikely that any team will produce a full-eleven of home-grown talent in such a way again.”
The book was the runner-up in prestigious The Cricket Society Book of the Year award.
It is occasionally available from the specialist cricket booksellers in the U.K.
Worth keeping an eye on the availability as it, besides being an important piece of cricket literature, is a cracking read.