A thread (a mostly apocryphal yet would love to believe in story) on John Bart King: Greatest of all American cricketers. (Yes, they did played cricket during late 1800s to early 1900s)
Story from @Ram_Guha edited book, 'The Picador book of Cricket'
#Cricket
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The cricket championship tournament of Philadelphia was called The Halifax Cup. King used to dominate in this series. From 1904 to '08 he won the Batting Cup 3 times & the Bowling Cup 4 times, & he twice exceeded 300 in an innings, once in 1905 vs Germantown & in 1906 vs Merion
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It was during this period that one of my favourite cricketing stories has its origin. It has been told and retold so many times that obviously there are many versions of it, but all scepticism apart, I would like to believe it to be true.
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So the story happens at a Halifax Cup match between Belmont (King's team) vs Trenton at Elmwood. The Trenton captain missed his train, and when he arrived on the ground about an hour late he found that in his absence his side had won the toss and batted and were doing badly;
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by the time he had changed and got ready to bat, 9 of the side were out & he had to bat #11.On his way to the wicket the Trenton Cap apologized to his opposite for being so unpunctual, adding unwisely that his team wouldn’t have been in such a mess if he hadn’t missed his train
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