Fred Barratt
Encyclopedia
Fred Barratt played first-class
cricket
for Nottinghamshire
from 1914 to 1931 and represented England
in five Test matches
, one in the home series against South Africa
in 1929 and four on the inaugural Test series against New Zealand
in the 1929-30 season.
From a mining background, Barratt was a right-arm fast bowler who, according to Wisden
, combined "swerve with his pace". He was also a right-handed lower-order batsman whose batting was always forthright, but became suddenly quite proficient from 1928 onwards.
in one of the set-piece season-openers at Lord's in 1914, he took eight wickets for 91 runs in the first innings. He followed that with five for 58 in his first County Championship
match. And by the end of his first season he had amassed 115 first-class wickets at an average
of 21.80, including 10 instances of five wickets or more in an innings and three of 10 or more in a match. Against Leicestershire
at Trent Bridge
late in the season, he took eight for 75 in an innings, improving on his debut figures.
Barratt then lost the next four years of his cricket career to the First World War and when it resumed in 1919, according to his obituary in Wisden
, "he was slow in finding his old form". He took 58 wickets in the limited 1919 fixtures, 68 in 1920 and 91 in 1921. Though his batting average
across these seasons and beyond was low – he managed 16 runs per innings in 1919, but did not approach that again until the late 1920s – there were individual innings of power and brilliance. Against Sussex
in 1919, he made 82 while batting at No 9, with his partners in ninth and tenth wicket partnerships contributing only 11 out of 60 runs. And in 1921 against Hampshire
, he made 79 out of a partnership of 129 in 50 minutes for the eighth wicket with Dodger Whysall
that led Nottinghamshire to an unlikely victory after they had fallen to 65 for six in search of 286 to win.
team: the innings, which totalled just 47, lasted only 75 minutes. He maintained form in 1923, with 101 wickets and made the highest score of his career so far with 92 in "a wonderful display of hitting" against Leicestershire.
The seasons between 1924 and 1927 saw a slight dropping off from Barratt, though he remained an important part of the Nottinghamshire side. In Wisden 1925, he was singled out for consistency. In both 1924 and 1925, he took more than 90 wickets at an average of less than 20 runs per wicket, but in 1926, that fell to just 66 wickets at a cost of 32 runs apiece. The recovery to 75 wickets at 21.14 in 1927 owed something to his fourth return of eight wickets in an innings, eight for 53 against Worcestershire
at Trent Bridge. Nor was the batting anything out of the ordinary: he failed to pass 50 in 1924, 1925 or 1926, and reached a highest of only 57 in 1927.
year, all the more surprising. In all matches, he took 114 wickets at a cost of 25.18 runs each and, unexpectedly, made 1167 runs at an average of 29.17, not far short of double the average and more than double the aggregate he had achieved in any other season before. Wisden had an explanation for his sudden advance: it attributed it to "waiting more patiently than heretofore for the right ball to hit". It added that he "gave some remarkable displays of high speed scoring which never degenerated into mere slogging". The 1928 season saw the only two centuries of Barratt's career. The first, an unbeaten 139 which remained his highest score, came in a high-scoring match on an easy pitch with short boundaries at Coventry, and set some records. Nottinghamshire's total of 656 for three declared was the highest at the time for the loss of only three wickets, and four of the five batsmen used – George Gunn
, Whysall, Willis Walker and Barratt – made hundreds. Barratt, unusually promoted to No 5, and Walker put on 196 in 84 minutes and Barratt's 139 included seven sixes and 18 fours in what Wisden termed "a remarkable display of powerful driving". The vast total was not a match-winner: Warwickshire
batted across the rest of the second day after Nottinghamshire's declaration, and then rain prevented any play on the third and final day, so that there was no decision even on first innings.
Less than two weeks later, Barratt made his second century, this time hitting an undefeated 110 in the home match against Glamorgan at Trent Bridge. He reached 50 in 30 minutes and his century in 85, and Wisden said it involved "some mighty hitting", including five sixes. It was not an innings without blemish: "He was missed on eight occasions—five times in the long field."
and 90 in 75 minutes against Middlesex
being noted by Wisden. Bowling alongside Harold Larwood
and Bill Voce
in "an attack superior to that of any other county", Barratt took, in all matches, 129 wickets at a cost of 21.24 runs each. And when Larwood was injured before the Fourth Test against the South Africans
at Old Trafford, Barratt was picked to replace him in a side captained by his county captain, Arthur Carr
. He took one wicket in each innings in a match that England
won by an innings. He was not picked for the final match of the series, when his place was taken by Nobby Clark
of Northamptonshire
.
In the winter of 1929-30, MCC picked tour parties to visit the newly Test-playing West Indies and New Zealand. Both sides were a mixture of established Test players and other county standard amateurs and professionals, and some "star" players of the time opted out entirely. Barratt was picked for the tour to New Zealand, with some first-class matches (but not Test matches) being played in Australia as well. He had what Wisden called "days of effectiveness with the ball". They included two good matches on the Australian leg of the tour, taking nine wickets in the match against South Australia and five in an innings against Victoria. But although he played in all four Tests in New Zealand, he was not successful, taking only three wickets in the series, and never more than one in an innings. And on the tour as a whole, his batting was not up to his recent standards, with no scores of 50 in the 11 first-class matches he played in.
, he and Sam Staples
put on 82 in half and hour, and in Barratt's innings of 72 there were five sixes. But by his last Championship match in August, in an admittedly strong batting line-up, Barratt was batting at No 11, and failing to take a wicket. At the end of the 1931 season, he retired from first-class cricket.
First-class cricket
First-class cricket is a class of cricket that consists of matches of three or more days' scheduled duration, that are between two sides of eleven players and are officially adjudged first-class by virtue of the standard of the competing teams...
cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
for Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club
Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Nottinghamshire, and the current county champions. Its limited overs team is called the Nottinghamshire Outlaws...
from 1914 to 1931 and represented England
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...
in five Test matches
Test cricket
Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...
, one in the home series against South Africa
South African cricket team
The South African national cricket team represent South Africa in international cricket. They are administrated by Cricket South Africa.South Africa is a full member of the International Cricket Council, also known as ICC, with Test and One Day International, or ODI, status...
in 1929 and four on the inaugural Test series against New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
in the 1929-30 season.
From a mining background, Barratt was a right-arm fast bowler who, according to Wisden
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom...
, combined "swerve with his pace". He was also a right-handed lower-order batsman whose batting was always forthright, but became suddenly quite proficient from 1928 onwards.
Early career
His debut in first-class cricket was sensational. Picked for Nottinghamshire to play against MCCMarylebone Cricket Club
Marylebone Cricket Club is a cricket club in London founded in 1787. Its influence and longevity now witness it as a private members' club dedicated to the development of cricket. It owns, and is based at, Lord's Cricket Ground in St John's Wood, London NW8. MCC was formerly the governing body of...
in one of the set-piece season-openers at Lord's in 1914, he took eight wickets for 91 runs in the first innings. He followed that with five for 58 in his first County Championship
County Championship
The County Championship is the domestic first-class cricket competition in England and Wales...
match. And by the end of his first season he had amassed 115 first-class wickets at an average
Bowling average
Bowling average is a statistic measuring the performance of bowlers in the sport of cricket.A bowler's bowling average is defined as the total number of runs conceded by the bowlers divided by the number of wickets taken by the bowler, so the lower the average the better. It is similar to earned...
of 21.80, including 10 instances of five wickets or more in an innings and three of 10 or more in a match. Against Leicestershire
Leicestershire County Cricket Club
Leicestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Leicestershire. It has also been representative of the county of Rutland....
at Trent Bridge
Trent Bridge
Trent Bridge is a Test, One-day international and County cricket ground located in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England and is also the headquarters of Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club. As well as International cricket and Nottinghamshire's home games, the ground has hosted the Finals Day of...
late in the season, he took eight for 75 in an innings, improving on his debut figures.
Barratt then lost the next four years of his cricket career to the First World War and when it resumed in 1919, according to his obituary in Wisden
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom...
, "he was slow in finding his old form". He took 58 wickets in the limited 1919 fixtures, 68 in 1920 and 91 in 1921. Though his batting average
Batting average
Batting average is a statistic in both cricket and baseball that measures the performance of cricket batsmen and baseball hitters. The two statistics are related in that baseball averages are directly descended from the concept of cricket averages.- Cricket :...
across these seasons and beyond was low – he managed 16 runs per innings in 1919, but did not approach that again until the late 1920s – there were individual innings of power and brilliance. Against Sussex
Sussex County Cricket Club
Sussex County Cricket Club is the oldest of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Sussex. The club was founded as a successor to Brighton Cricket Club which was a representative of the county of Sussex as a...
in 1919, he made 82 while batting at No 9, with his partners in ninth and tenth wicket partnerships contributing only 11 out of 60 runs. And in 1921 against Hampshire
Hampshire County Cricket Club
Hampshire County Cricket Club represents the historic county of Hampshire in cricket's County Championship. The club was founded in 1863 as a successor to the Hampshire county cricket teams and has played at the Antelope Ground from then until 1885, before moving to the County Ground where it...
, he made 79 out of a partnership of 129 in 50 minutes for the eighth wicket with Dodger Whysall
Dodger Whysall
William Wilfrid "Dodger" Whysall was a cricketer who played for Nottinghamshire and England....
that led Nottinghamshire to an unlikely victory after they had fallen to 65 for six in search of 286 to win.
Middle years
Better bowling form returned in 1922, when Barratt took 109 wickets at 16.33 runs each, the best bowling average in a single season in his career. Among the wickets were his career-best innings figures, eight for 26 against what Wisden termed a "helpless" GlamorganGlamorgan County Cricket Club
Glamorgan County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Glamorgan aka Glamorganshire . Glamorgan CCC is the only Welsh first-class cricket club. Glamorgan CCC have won the English County...
team: the innings, which totalled just 47, lasted only 75 minutes. He maintained form in 1923, with 101 wickets and made the highest score of his career so far with 92 in "a wonderful display of hitting" against Leicestershire.
The seasons between 1924 and 1927 saw a slight dropping off from Barratt, though he remained an important part of the Nottinghamshire side. In Wisden 1925, he was singled out for consistency. In both 1924 and 1925, he took more than 90 wickets at an average of less than 20 runs per wicket, but in 1926, that fell to just 66 wickets at a cost of 32 runs apiece. The recovery to 75 wickets at 21.14 in 1927 owed something to his fourth return of eight wickets in an innings, eight for 53 against Worcestershire
Worcestershire County Cricket Club
Worcestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Worcestershire...
at Trent Bridge. Nor was the batting anything out of the ordinary: he failed to pass 50 in 1924, 1925 or 1926, and reached a highest of only 57 in 1927.
All-rounder
This fallow period in the mid 1920s made his emergence as a genuine all-rounder in the 1928 season, his benefitBenefit (sports)
A benefit or testimonial is a match or season of activities granted by a sporting body to a loyal sportsman to boost their income before retirement. Often this is in the form of a match for which all the ticket proceeds are given to the player in question.There have been occasions when a...
year, all the more surprising. In all matches, he took 114 wickets at a cost of 25.18 runs each and, unexpectedly, made 1167 runs at an average of 29.17, not far short of double the average and more than double the aggregate he had achieved in any other season before. Wisden had an explanation for his sudden advance: it attributed it to "waiting more patiently than heretofore for the right ball to hit". It added that he "gave some remarkable displays of high speed scoring which never degenerated into mere slogging". The 1928 season saw the only two centuries of Barratt's career. The first, an unbeaten 139 which remained his highest score, came in a high-scoring match on an easy pitch with short boundaries at Coventry, and set some records. Nottinghamshire's total of 656 for three declared was the highest at the time for the loss of only three wickets, and four of the five batsmen used – George Gunn
George Gunn
George Gunn was an English cricketer who played in 15 Tests from 1907 to 1930. Along with other notable batsmen such as Jack Hobbs, Frank Woolley and Phil Mead, he was one of a group who, beginning their first-class careers in the Edwardian Era, seemed to go on for ever...
, Whysall, Willis Walker and Barratt – made hundreds. Barratt, unusually promoted to No 5, and Walker put on 196 in 84 minutes and Barratt's 139 included seven sixes and 18 fours in what Wisden termed "a remarkable display of powerful driving". The vast total was not a match-winner: Warwickshire
Warwickshire County Cricket Club
Warwickshire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Warwickshire. Its limited overs team is called the Warwickshire Bears. Their kit colours are black and gold and the shirt sponsor...
batted across the rest of the second day after Nottinghamshire's declaration, and then rain prevented any play on the third and final day, so that there was no decision even on first innings.
Less than two weeks later, Barratt made his second century, this time hitting an undefeated 110 in the home match against Glamorgan at Trent Bridge. He reached 50 in 30 minutes and his century in 85, and Wisden said it involved "some mighty hitting", including five sixes. It was not an innings without blemish: "He was missed on eight occasions—five times in the long field."
Test cricketer
Barratt maintained his 1928 form into the 1929 season, when Nottinghamshire won the County Championship for the first time since 1907. He made 860 runs at an average of 22.05, and twice scored more than 90 without reaching a century. As before his runs came quickly: 94 in 80 minutes against SurreySurrey County Cricket Club
Surrey County Cricket Club is one of the 18 professional county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Surrey. Its limited overs team is called the Surrey Lions...
and 90 in 75 minutes against Middlesex
Middlesex County Cricket Club
Middlesex County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Middlesex. It was announced in February 2009 that Middlesex changed their limited overs name from the Middlesex Crusaders, to the...
being noted by Wisden. Bowling alongside Harold Larwood
Harold Larwood
Harold Larwood was an English cricket player, an extremely accurate fast bowler best known for his key role as the implementer of fast leg theory in the infamous "bodyline" Ashes Test series of 1932–33....
and Bill Voce
Bill Voce
Bill Voce was an English cricketer. He played for the Nottinghamshire and England, and was an instrumental part of England's infamous Bodyline tour of Australia in 1932–1933.-Life and career:...
in "an attack superior to that of any other county", Barratt took, in all matches, 129 wickets at a cost of 21.24 runs each. And when Larwood was injured before the Fourth Test against the South Africans
South African cricket team in England in 1929
The South African cricket team toured England in the 1929 season to play a five-match Test series against England.England won the series 2-0 with 3 matches drawn.-Test series summary:* [ 1st Test] at Edgbaston – match drawn...
at Old Trafford, Barratt was picked to replace him in a side captained by his county captain, Arthur Carr
Arthur Carr
Arthur William Carr was an English cricket player. He played for the Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club and the English cricket team, captaining both sides....
. He took one wicket in each innings in a match that England
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...
won by an innings. He was not picked for the final match of the series, when his place was taken by Nobby Clark
Edward Clark (cricketer)
Edward Winchester 'Nobby' Clark was a Northamptonshire cricketer of the inter-war period during which they were one of the weakest counties ever to play in the County Championship...
of Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire County Cricket Club
Northamptonshire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Northamptonshire. Its limited overs team is called the Northants Steelbacks. The traditional club colour is Maroon. During the...
.
In the winter of 1929-30, MCC picked tour parties to visit the newly Test-playing West Indies and New Zealand. Both sides were a mixture of established Test players and other county standard amateurs and professionals, and some "star" players of the time opted out entirely. Barratt was picked for the tour to New Zealand, with some first-class matches (but not Test matches) being played in Australia as well. He had what Wisden called "days of effectiveness with the ball". They included two good matches on the Australian leg of the tour, taking nine wickets in the match against South Australia and five in an innings against Victoria. But although he played in all four Tests in New Zealand, he was not successful, taking only three wickets in the series, and never more than one in an innings. And on the tour as a whole, his batting was not up to his recent standards, with no scores of 50 in the 11 first-class matches he played in.
The end of the cricket career
Back in England in 1930, Barratt had what Wisden called "an unsatisfactory season". He scored 502 runs with three scores of more than 50, but his tally of wickets fell from 129 in 1929 to just 51, and their cost rose from 21 runs each to more than 31. Wisden cited wet pitches in a wet summer as a cause, but Barratt was also, by this stage, 36 years old. The following season, 1931, underlined the decline. In 21 County Championship matches, Barratt took only 24 wickets at a cost of more than 41 runs each, and he scored only 305 runs in these games at an average of 12.70. There was one last hurrah as a batsman: against KentKent County Cricket Club
Kent County Cricket Club is one of the 18 first class county county cricket clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the county of Kent...
, he and Sam Staples
Sam Staples (cricketer)
Samuel James Staples was a Nottinghamshire cricketer of the 1920s and early 1930s. He played in three Tests for England against South Africa in 1927-28 but did modestly on the matting wickets...
put on 82 in half and hour, and in Barratt's innings of 72 there were five sixes. But by his last Championship match in August, in an admittedly strong batting line-up, Barratt was batting at No 11, and failing to take a wicket. At the end of the 1931 season, he retired from first-class cricket.