Description
Thanks to his discovery of a collection of scrapbooks and memorabilia, writer and filmmaker Michael Burns is able to relate for the first time the remarkable story of Surrey and England cricketer Jack Crawford. A schoolboy prodigy who took Edwardian cricket by storm, the amateur all-rounder became Surrey's youngest ever centurion and, at 19 years and 32 days, England's youngest Test player. However, a row over captaining a weakened team against the Australians led to a spectacular fallout - and a life ban by his county. Emigration to Australia ensued, where Crawford established himself as one of the world's great all-rounders; yet controversy dogged him, on and off the pitch. Having married and deserted an Adelaide teenage beauty, Crawford then dodged involvement in the Great War. He returned to England to divorce, re-marry and fade into middle-aged obscurity, but not before playing two of the most remarkable innings of his life.
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Reviews
"Crawford's story is unconventional and fascinating and well told... Crawford's motto was to play cricket and see the world. On his passing aged 76, he left the equivalent of 70,000 pounds to his second wife. It was indeed a good life - chequered, but good." --Ken Piesse, www.cricketbooks.com.au
"A Flick of the Fingers is a book I have no hesitation in recommending, although it is not quite perfect... It would be fascinating to know what Crawford, in the autumn of his years, had thought of young man who had given so much pleasure and caused such controversy back in Edwardian times, but sadly there was no one left for Burns to ask... There are some fascinating photographs, sourced no doubt from the family scrapbooks. Amongst them are some excellent images of Crawford in action - they are eye-catching to say the least and are almost, as the saying goes, worth the entrance money on their own." --Martin Chandler, cricketweb.net
"Michael Burns's biography of a player who was regarded as perhaps the finest schoolboy cricketer of all time, who made his debut for Surrey aged 17 and completed the double of 1,000 runs and 100 wickets in a season before he was 20. Short-sighted, he played always in spectacles yet was a ferocious hitter, a skilful medium pace bowler and a forthright character whose outspokenness at being given a weakened team to captain in a match against the touring Australians in 1909 resulted ultimately in him being banished by the county, whereupon he emigrated to Australia. There he enhanced a reputation for fast scoring that would have made him a hot property in today's game. Representing an Australian XI on tour in New Zealand, he hit 45 fours and 14 sixes in an innings of 354 that included a staggering partnership with Victor Trumper that added 298 runs in just 69 minutes." --The Sports Bookshelf.com
Author Biography
As a filmmaker, Michael Burns has produced nine cricket films, while he is also the author of a centenary history of his local club, Malden Wanderers, and articles for Wisden Cricket Monthly and the MCC Magazine. A Gentleman Cricketer, one of the four documentaries Michael has made for MCC, won the 2008 Cricket Society Media Award.
Bibliographic Information
- Publisher Pitch Publishing
- Publication Date March 2015
- Orginal LanguageEnglish
- ISBN/Identifier 9781785310096
- Publication Country or regionUnited Kingdom
- FormatHardback
- Primary Price 17.99 GBP
- Pages192
- ReadershipGeneral
- Publish StatusPublished
- Dimensions240x160 mm
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