Cricketing Autumn: T. A. TUCKER

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30028, 12 January 1963, Page 9

Cricketing Autumn: T. A. TUCKER

YOU will not And his name 1 among Canterbury’s Plunket Shield records. No rapturous essays have been written about his flashing batting or demoniacal bowling. But T. A. Tucker has done more for cricket than all but a handful of the heroes of Lancaster Park. It is the same in almost any successful undertaking. There is always someone in the background, working with quiet efficiency to further the interests of the project Essentially unselfish, never seeking or expecting publicity, Trevor Tucker has been one of the strong props on which Canterbury cricket has leaned for many years. Not that his contribution to the game has been limited to administration. He was a senior player, and a good one, for 10 years, and he has been playing for the St Albans club in every season, save for two when he was away on war service, since 1928. He is still playing in the president’s grade, and he is part of a very notable bowling combination. Just as the Old Boys team in this grade is immediately identified with the bowling of H. R. Escott and P. A. Small, so does St Albans look to Tucker and E. Mulcock to dismiss its opponents. Partnership It may well be that Tucker and Mulcock have set up something of a record for the duration of an opening bowling partnership. They have had a good few years in the president’s competition together, and they were opening the bowling for the St. Albans senior team 30 years ago.

As a youngster, Tucker’s interest in cricket was encouraged by understanding parents. His father, Austra-lian-born, had played in Melbourne, so there was little prospect of him regarding cricket as a waste of time. And his mother seemed to understand about the inevitability of an occasional window being broken. Then at the Elmwood school he found in R. H. North, a representative player and a well-known teacher, just the man to sharpen a growing enthusiasm for the summer game.

At Christchurch Boys’ High School, where Tucker played a few games for the first eleven, one of his most notable adversaries was F. P. O’Brien, of St. Bede’s College. These friendly rivals decided when they left school, to join R. H. North’s club —it was very nearly that, in those days. There is little likelihood of Tucker forgetting his first senior match, in 1932-33. He had had considerable success in his seasons in the lower grades, but at this time an oil-break bowler had to be really accurate, > or be broken on the wheel I

°£the nod, aggressive batI* ?’ J‘- Kerr ' A- w Roberts. 1 B. Cromb led the way, but there were others not far behind. Tucker, like most offspinners, also had an outswinger at his command, and it was one of these which found the edge of the bat and flew at slip, a fieldsman who must remain nameless but who was noted for his occasional bouts of somnolence. On this occasion, he was rudely awakened by the ball striking him smartly in the mid-riff. With an exclamation of surprise and pain, he clutched his hands over the offended portion and the catch was made. So it was J. L. Kerr out—and no bowler could have wished tor a more important scalp. As the years went by. Tucker became more and more devoted to the outswinger, and now it is the occasional off-break which provides the variation. But he has always had an excellent control of length and direction, and his senior seasons were successful ones—successful in the moderate, modest manner of the man But he was good enough to be in the special coaching group governed by the Hampshire, professional, J. Newman, about 1929 and 1930. Tucker recalls those days with particular pleassure. There was a whole hour of daylight saving at that time, cricketers were keen, and to young eyes, Hagley Oval never looked better. There would be practice after work, and then Newman, provided with a cup of tea by the wife of the groundsman, would sit and talk, in his rich and loamy voice, of cricket and cricketers the world over. There in the dusk all the magic bonds the game spins to join people in every corner of the earth settled about young Tucker, as the master talked to his pupils. And it would be 10 p_m. before the youngsters reached home for their evening meal They were simpler days. If he went home with his head full of great names and

great deeds, of the lore and the laughter of the game, Trevor Tucker stall had his feet firmly on the ground. He must have seen that the game he cherished needed people to work for it. He has certainly done his share. He has held every office in his club, many of them for long years. He has been on the Canterbury Cricket Association for 26 years assistant-secretary, treasurer (for two terms), president, chairman of the management committee, even, for a while, acting-secretary. And there were five years on the New Zealand Cricket Council, too.

Quietly-spoken, friendly, and with a strong sense of duty and responsibility, Tucker’s career in administration has been rather like his bowling life. Time after time, when the last opponent has been dismissed, Mulcock—with seven or eight of the wickets—has walked alongside Tucker —with two or three. And Mulcock, an astute judge if ever there was one, has

shaken his bead in a familiar gesture, and said in all sincerity that iris friend and bowling companion should have had more of foe spoils. It often falls out that way; bowlers are complementary, and tight bowling at one end can bring victims at foe other. So has it been in administration. A co-operative attitude, enthusiasm, a capacity for work, have made Trevor Tucker among the most valued and respected of cricketers. And he is not done with foe game yet, by any means. Apparently, in the years ahead, it will be a gradual return to off-spin-ners. One may hope it is a long and profitable process.