County Championship 4th (W 15 D 8 L 3)
Captain Arthur Carr
A fourth-place finish was perhaps scant reward for a successful season with only three defeats in the Championship campaign; curiously, Notts lost two of the matches at home and had a marginally better record away from Trent Bridge.
Arthur Carr led by example with the bat – making more than 2,000 runs in the season, the first Nottinghamshire batter to do so since AO Jones twenty-five years earlier. Carr made seven centuries, including a career high of 206, and averaged 53.25.
Wilf Payton had a very good season and scored three centuries as did ‘Dodge’ Whysall; Willis Walker with two centuries earned himself a regular place in the side. Altogether six of the team scored centuries.
The bowling was led, as so often, by Len Richmond and Sam Staples, who each too a hundred wickets in the season and undoubtedly strengthened by the introduction of Harold Larwood who took 73 wickets at just over 18 runs per wicket in his first full season (20 matches).
Interestingly, given his subsequent fearsome reputation, the Committee Report for 1925 welcomes the ‘fast medium right-hand bowler from Nuncargate’!
Ben Lilley also had his first full season, coming into the side to replace the retired Tom Oates, who had been keeper for 29 years. Oates was a tough act to follow but Lilley acquitted himself well and contributed more than 1,000 First-Class runs.
Notts had a promising start to the season and were unbeaten in their first seven games, including the only non-Championship fixture of 1925 against Cambridge University at Fenner’s.
Although rain was not a major factor in this summer, it did curtail the season opener, a low-scoring draw with Hampshire.
With the full three days available to them at home to Sussex, Notts won by an innings and 25; Arthur Carr made 104, the first ton of his excellent season.
An unbroken opening stand of 139 between George Gunn and Whysall (67 and 68 respectively) in the second innings secured a comfortable 10-wicket win at home to Derbyshire. Leicestershire were even more emphatically beaten, Notts clinching an innings and 55 run win, despatching the visitors for 78 and 69 in response to the home side’s 202. Richmond’s second innings figures were 13-6-10-6.
A fifth successive home fixture resulted in a high-scoring draw with Surrey. George Gunn’s 117 led Notts to 399 in their first innings which Surrey more than matched, making 454. When Nottinghamshire batted again, they were 231-6 at the close.
The first away match of the summer was the return fixture with Leicestershire and Notts completed a hefty double, adding 100 runs to the margin of victory from a fortnight earlier. Leicester made 253, Frank Matthews 6-81, and, led by Carr’s double hundred, Notts 509-7 declared. The home team subsided to 101 all out, leaving Notts winners by an innings and 155 runs.
Another innings victory followed, despite Cambridge University making a healthy 305; Notts replied with 445, Payton 140, and then bowled out the students for 130, Richmond and Staples sharing the wickets.
This was followed by the first defeat of the season, away to eventual Champions Yorkshire at Bramhall Lane. Runs were at a premium but the Tykes, with 157 and 148-5, did enough to beat Notts, 139 and 165, by five wickets.
Back home for the Worcestershire match, Notts got back to winning ways, dismissing the visitors for 161 and 110 (Larwood seven wickets in the game, his first match-winning contribution) and making 173 and 100-3 to win by seven wickets.
They lost at home for the first time that season when visitors Middlesex eased home in a match of striking contrasts.
Notts batted first and eked out a meagre 167 but then bowled out Middlesex for just 127. When Notts compiled an impressive 461-9 declared, built around tons from Arthur Carr and Wilf Payton, the win looked on; but the visitors had other ideas and, with a double hundred from Patsy Hendren and centuries from Frank Mann and the grandly-named Clarence Napier Bruce, made 502-6 and won by four wickets.
Nottinghamshire then went on a run of eight games unbeaten, starting with an away victory over Northamptonshire. Northants made 156 (Sam Staples 7-67) and Notts replied with 214. In their second innings, the home side rallied and made 367 (Richard Wright 103).
Faced with making 339 to win, Notts had hundreds from the alliteratively named William Whysall and Willis Walker as they notched up 340-3 and won by seven wickets.
There followed a draw against Lancashire at Trent Bridge in which Ernest Tyldesley and Arthur Carr each made tons.
Larwood made his mark in a comfortable 317-run victory over Glamorgan at Trent Bridge, taking 4-14 in the visitors' first innings of 112 and making his highest score to date as a batter, 44no, in Notts’ 246. Willis Walker made his second century of the season, 115 which was his best to date, as the home team made 368-3 declared and dismissed the Welshmen for 185.
Nottinghamshire beat Kent by 46 runs at Tunbridge Wells in a match most notable for the County Championship debut of Percy Chapman.
This was decidedly unusual in that Chapman had been a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1919 (when the selection was made from schoolboy cricketers), had played First-Class cricket (for Cambridge University) and made his Test debut all before playing in County matches.
In this game he scored 18 and 49 and took a couple of catches – a decent start but nothing to suggest that a year later he would displace Arthur Carr as England’s Test captain.
Centuries from Dodge Whysall, Maurice Tate and Arthur Carr were the features of a 192-run victory over Sussex at Hove.
A move along the South Coast to Southampton followed, with a draw against Hampshire. For the home side, the start was – as so often – the great Phil Mead who made 112 in a first innings of 348.
John Gunn led the response, making 166 to steer Notts to 400-6 declared. This was to be the last century of a long and successful career for a player of whom the Committee said: ‘He can look back with pride on a wonderful record, batting, bowling and fielding, with a claim to be considered the greatest all-round left-hander Notts. has ever produced.’ (Now there’s subject for debate).
If that was a fairly comfortable draw the next one, against Yorkshire at home, saw Notts hanging on. After Yorks had made 368 and 142-4, Notts were on the rack at 103-9, still well short of the 214 needed, when stumps were drawn.
A third successive draw was played out versus Derbyshire at Ilkeston in a rain-affected game. At the end of Day One, Notts had reached 381-5 (Whysall 140) but by the close of Day Two had moved only to 386-5, leaving no time to complete the game.
Kent came to Trent Bridge and inflicted the second home defeat on Notts. The home team faced a first innings deficit of 51 runs but seemed to have set a challenging target, making 377 in their second innings, led by another Carr century. Led by skipper Jack Bryan, who made 172, the visiting side made the 329 required, for the loss of six wickets.
Another unbeaten streak of eight games took Nottinghamshire to the end of a successful season.
Yet another Carr century was the bedrock of a draw v Surrey at The Oval; a similar result followed at Old Trafford against Lancashire.
Gloucestershire were routed at Cheltenham, even though Notts made just 122 in their first innings. Richmond, with 14, and Staples (6) took all the wickets as Gloucs were dismissed for 66 and 89, leaving Notts to make 36, which they did, but not without losing three early wickets.
Revenge was extracted from Middlesex in the away game at Lord’s, although Notts made heavy weather of a straightforward fourth innings chase, finishing on 106-7 to win be three wickets.
Northants fared no better at Trent Bridge than they did at home – losing by an innings and 48 runs. Harold Larwood scored his first First-Class fifty, making 70 in Notts’ only innings but on this occasion was outbowled by Fred Barratt, who took 7-53 in Northants first innings, and by Len Richmond who took 9-55 in the second, en route to which he passed 100 wickets for the season.
Gloucestershire were the next visitors and equally easily despatched, Notts winning by 6 wickets.
Harold Larwood showed his true worth in the match when Worcestershire hosted Notts at New Road and were beaten by 192 runs.
He too eleven wickets in match, a maiden ‘five-fer’ (5-24) in the first innings and the even better figures of 12.4-4-17-6 in the second, thus setting his (then) career best twice in the same match!
Larwood took another five-wicket haul in the final match of the season away to Glamorgan at Swansea as Notts out-gunned the home side to win by five wickets. It was a low scoring way to end the season with Glamorgan’s 128 in their second knock the highest of the four innings – Notts finished on 97-5.
Frank Shipston made his debut for Nottinghamshire in this game. He went on the play 49 First-Class matches for his home county as a robust middle order batter; his career best score was 118no against Hampshire in 1932, in which season he made his only other century (102 versus Glamorgan).
The only other debutant that season for Notts was Stanley Richardson, who had deputised for John Gunn in the match against Cambridge University. A good club cricketer, mainly with Notts Amateurs, he played two other First-Class matches, both for his native county of Warwickshire; he also turned out for Sir Julien Cahn’s XI on occasions.
The ground underwent some improvements during 1925 with the erection of an entirely new entrance near the Trent Bridge Inn. The score board was taken down and a new one erected; other improvements were to turnstile entrances on Fox Road, and an exit for cars on Hound Road.
These changes, plus approval for the erection of two open concrete stands on the ‘popular side’ in anticipation of increased crowds for the Ashes Test of 1926, led the Annual Report to say: ‘Your Committee considers that when these improvements are completed the Ground will be one of the best equipped in the country’.
On Whit Sunday, the rest day of the Surrey game, a Memorial to Alfred Shaw was unveiled in Gedling Church Yard by Arthur Carr. The inscription on the stone is as follows; “Alfred Shaw, Born at Burton Joyce 29th August 1842; Died at Gedling 16th January 1907. A World-famed Cricketer who Captained Nottinghamshire, The Players and England. Erected by the Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club in memory of his personal qualities and past achievements.”
Scorecards and stats can be seen here
May 2024