Thomas Wass

Thomas Wass
Personal information
Batting style Right-handed batsman
Bowling style Right arm fast-medium
International information
National side English
Career statistics
Competition First-class
Matches 312
Runs scored 2,138
Batting average 7.29
100s/50s 0/1
Top score 56
Balls bowled 71,399
Wickets 1,666
Bowling average 20.46
5 wickets in innings 159
10 wickets in match 45
Best bowling 9-67
Catches/stumpings 114/0
Source: CricketArchive,

Thomas Wass (Thomas George Wass or simply Tom Wass; 26 December 1873, Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, England – 27 October 1953, Sutton-in-Ashfield) was a Nottinghamshire bowler who is best remembered, along with Hallam, for bowling that gave Nottinghamshire a brilliant County Championship win in 1907. Wass also holds the record for the most wickets taken for Nottinghamshire - 1633 for 20.34 each.

Tall and solidly built, Wass had a highly rhythmic run-up that allowed him to be, in his prime, fast through the air. However, it was his leg-cutter that made him formidable, and Wass unlike most fast bowlers of the time was very dangerous after rain but less effective on a firm pitch when the ball did not turn.[1] He also had a very difficult slower ball that on his best days caught many batsmen unaware[2]. Wass was a very moderate fieldsman and had no pretensions to be a batsman - though he did score 56 against Derbyshire in 1906, he was dropped four times in doing so[3].

Wass began his career in local cricket but became a professional for Edinburgh Academicals and Liverpool.[4] Qualified by residence, Wass was offered a place on the Lancashire staff but declined,[5] yet he still took some time to establish himself in a Nottinghamshire side that was in the late 1890s exceedingly weak in bowling[6]. In his first two full seasons, he had very modest records, but in 1900, he became Nottinghamshire's chief bowler with John Gunn. In 1901, apart from one match on a sticky wicket against a weak Derbyshire eleven, Wass was so disappointing he was dropped from the side. He took 58 wickets at the contemporaneously high cost of 29.72.[7] On the wet wickets of 1902 he was one of the most difficult bowlers in the game. He captured 140 wkts at 15.89. It remains noteworthy how Wass's bowling was the decisive factor in each Nottinghamshire victory that summer:

In 1903, despite numerous soft pitches, Wass was less effective taking 76 wickets, but in 1904, though overworked in unfavourable conditions, he appeared for the Players at Kennington Oval. In 1905, he was at times deadly but handicapped by an injury in a local game.

May 1906 saw Wass at his deadliest, including one of the most remarkable games in county cricket at Aigburth, where he took 16 wickets in a day, yet Nottinghamshire still lost. However, after he recovered from a strain sustained in the Whitsuntide game against Surrey "the long-continued dry weather found out his limitations" (Wisden 1907). In 1907, however, Wass opened with something even more sensational: taking 6 wickets for 3 runs against the MCC after two blank days. This time wet weather continued almost continuously all summer, allowing Wass and Hallam to dominate match after match to such an extent that they took 298 wickets between them in just nineteen games and Nottinghamshire won fifteen of these and were never defeated. Nobody else bar John Gunn did any serious work, and Gunn took only 25 wickets in seventeen matches in which he bowled.

Wass was chosen in the thirteen for the First Test against South Africa at Lord's in 1907 but left out of the final eleven. In 1908, despite the fact that Hallam declined owing to rheumatism in his right shoulder, Wass remained at his best and took sixteen for 103 in a day against Essex[8]. 1909, a summer as wet as 1907, was very disappointing: although Hallam was back to full fitness, Wass had his worst record since 1905, but in the following two years Wass recovered his form and when helped by the wicket remained as formidable as ever despite having lost much of his former pace[9]. the wet summer of 1912 was disappointing with the wickets more helpful than ever: Wass took fifty fewer wickets than in 1907, and in 1913 he failed to reach 100 wickets in a full season for the first time in ten years, taking 98. 1914,[10] when Wass was handicapped by injury and missed seven games, saw him fall further to 69 wickets at his highest average since 1900. After the war he appeared only once, in Joe Hardstaff senior's benefit match. “Topsy” Wass was regarded as a character[11] but was generally popular drawing a remarkably warm tribute from Sir Pelham Warner when he died.[12]

References

  1. ^ Wisden 1954 p.930
  2. ^ See The Times, June 18, 1902; “Sporting Intelligence”
  3. ^ Pardon, Sydney H. (editor); John Wisden’s Cricketer’s Almanac; Forty-Fourth Edition (1907); Part II, p. 266
  4. ^ Wisden 1954 p.930
  5. ^ Wisden 1954 p.930
  6. ^ Pardon, Sydney H. (editor); John Wisden’s Cricketer’s Almanac; Thirty-Fifth Edition (1898), p. 162
  7. ^ http://www.cricketarchive.com/Archive/Players/33/33646/f_Bowling_by_Season.html
  8. ^ Pardon, Sydney H. (editor); John Wisden’s Cricketer’s Almanac; Forty-Sixth edition (1909); p. 141
  9. ^ Pardon, Sydney H. (editor); John Wisden’s Cricketer’s Almanac; Forty-Ninth edition (1912); Part II, pp. 141, 142, 252
  10. ^ http://www.cricketarchive.com/Archive/Players/33/33646/f_Bowling_by_Season.html
  11. ^ Wisden 1954 p.930
  12. ^ Cricketer Spring Annual Easter 1954

External links