deliveries columns catches/stumpings year tenfor bowling country fivefor batting image name lasttestyear column international testdebutdate source date runs testdebutyear wickets lasttestdate s/s matches article_title
285 44372 2 2 / - 141 / - 1899 -- 8 right-arm slow english -- 50 right-hand bat willis cuttell cigarette card.jpg willis cuttell 1899 tests first-class true 14 february http://content-aus.cricinfo.com/ci/content/player/10900.html 14 february 65 5938 1899 6 792 1 april - / - 5/21 2 227 willis cuttell

willis cuttell

willis robert cuttell -lrb- 13 september 1863 in sheffield , yorkshire -- 9 december 1929 in nelson , lancashire -rrb- was an english cricketer .
along with albert hallam , his support for briggs and mold gave lancashire its first official county championship victory in 1897 .
his bowling was also important to lancashire 's championship win seven years later , in which they went through the whole season without being beaten .
cuttell was a slow right-arm bowler who possessed the unusual ability to turn the ball from leg without throwing it up enough to encourage risk-taking batsmen to attack him .
he was very accurate in length and also possessed the characteristic break-back of most bowlers of his time , which made him as unplayable as any bowler when the pitch helped him .
he was very slow to move into first-class cricket .
cuttell 's early cricket was played for the accrington club in the lancashire league .
having been born in yorkshire and his father william cuttell having played for them in the 1860s , he decided to try for a place in the yorkshire eleven .
however , his form in a couple of matches against opposition that was not recognised as first-class was not encouraging , so that willis returned to league cricket .
from 1891 he shifted to the nelson club -lrb- later famous as where ted mcdonald played when qualifying for lancashire -rrb- and proved himself the best bowler in league cricket .
in 1895 he took 106 wickets for 8 1/2 runs apiece and in 1893 as many as 118 wickets fell to his bowling in league games .
cuttell , long qualified by residence for lancashire , was finally engaged by them for the season of 1896 .
he played only two games and then was dropped , but the following year , after a rather slow start , cuttell showed himself right up to the standard of first-class county cricket .
on hard pitches he was never especially difficult , but on the softer pitches at the end of the season he was frequently deadly , taking twelve for 81 in the last match against nottinghamshire .
his work on soft pitches was deadly enough for him to head the lancashire averages for all first-class games and was chosen as `` cricketer of the year '' by `` wisden '' .
in 1898 , with hallam ill , mold injured more than once , and briggs terribly out of form , cuttell became the mainstay of lancashire cricket .
although his wickets were very expensive considering the many rain-affected wickets , his batting advanced so much that he accomplished the `` double '' of 1,000 runs and 100 wickets .
he achieved his best haul of eight for 105 against gloucestershire on a good pitch in july .
he toured south africa because the matting wickets were expected to suit his style , but did nothing of remarkable quality in his only tests .
the following year , with very few pitches to help him , cuttell was less successful as a bowler and could not gain a place against australia , but he batted very well , scoring 137 against nottinghamshire and scoring more runs than in any other season .
1900 saw cuttell re-assert himself as one of the best bowlers in england , but with rhodes and haigh establishing themselves as the deadliest bowlers on sticky wickets cuttell 's days as a representative player were over .
1901 to 1903 were very disappointing both in batting and bowling , but in 1904 cuttell 's bowling on several sticky wickets in may was decisive in giving lancashire a surprise championship win after losing sydney barnes .
despite a dreadful 1905 , cuttell bowled with deadly effect in 1906 , being ahead even of haigh in the national bowling averages despite taking over 100 fewer wickets .
however , aged 43 , he had already decided on the post of coach at rugby , which he held right through to 1926 .
at the age of 63 , he then became an umpire in county matches , but could carry out this role for only two years before his health deteriorated too much .
