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Albert Beales lived at Manor Cottages, Garboldisham. He had two
presentation cricket balls which readily illustrated his skills on the
cricket pitch. One ball, practicaly unworn, carried an inscribed
silver disc which recorded the fact that on 7 September 1922 he took 10
wickets for one run against Botesdale. That run was scored through
the slips. "A wide-awake slip would have stopped it"
claimed Mr beales. He clean bowled nine of his victims, bowling
eight overs in all and ending with 4 wickets in his last 5 balls.
The other ball was presented to him, no less suitably silver mounted, for
his match winning feat in taking 6 wickets for 5 runs in a South Norfolk
League Semi-Final cup match on 27 august 1921.
Beales bowled with a nearly round-arm delivery. His balls kept
low in the air but the quality that made them bewitching to village
batsmen was their sharp swing from leg and nip off the pitch. He
always attacked from round the wicket and for eleven years in succession,
from 1921 to 1931, took over a hundred wickets for the village. The
feat is the more outstanding since in those days Garboldisham played no
Sunday games, but with matches on Saturdays and Bank Holidays, and a very
occasional mid-week fixture, rarely took part in more than 27 single
innings games in a season.
Some record of his bowling figures survived him. Apparently Rev C
A Sturgess, who was Rector at Garboldisham in the 1920s, was a cricketer
of more enthusiasm than skill, so he used space in the parish magazine to
publish the village side's end of season batting and bowling
statistics. The magazines showed: |
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Albert Beales felt that 1924 was his best ever as a village bowler.
Born in 1885 he celebrated his sixty-fourth birthday on 18 June 1949 by
taking 4 wickets for 11 runs against Barningham. He finished that
season, his last as it turned out, by again heading the Club's averages,
with 95 overs, 20 maidens and taking 30 wickets for 210 runs (no, you can
work that average out yourself!!). He recovered from a serious
throat operation but without the full use of his right leg, so his
cricketing days were done. He instead set to mastering bowls and in
1955 he won the singles championship at Bury St Edmunds.
Albert was also a gardener of some considerable skill, winning cups for
his superb fruit and vegetable exhibits at local flower shows but it is
his cricket memories that best sustain him
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