🦆 The Duck Pond

Recording the Match of Saturday, 16th August 1902 Our First Eleven, guests of Yalding CC, found the home bowling considerably more troublesome than the home hospitality, and three of our number were sent back to the pavilion without score. The exclusive zero club records its latest subscriptions below, each entered in the ledger with the solemnity such distinction properly deserves. 1st XI, away to Yalding CC Mr W Peach achieved the singular feat of visiting the timbers twice in the one afternoon and troubling the scorers on neither occasion. Opening the innings, he was held by the Reverend J R Leigh off the bowling of Mr F R Allsop, his first duck of the season and the second of a career now standing at eleven innings. Returning at number four, he fell again, caught by Mr H T Manwaring off Mr H Reeves, his second of the season and his third for the club. A plain pair, then, rather than the rarer and more gloriously abject king pair, but a pair nonetheless, and a feat of a very particular consistency. Mr Peach now occupies 25th place of 326 upon the club's roll of ducks. It may interest him to learn that upon this very date in 1893, one George Champion likewise failed to trouble the scorers, against the Free Foresters, so his affliction keeps distinguished company across the years. Mr P R Burton, at number eight, was caught by the Reverend Leigh off Mr R Leney, his first duck of the season and, in only his third innings for the club, his maiden entry upon the ledger. He takes his place 106th of 326. He too shares his misfortune with the calendar, for Mr Champion's duck of 1893, already noted above, fell upon this same sixteenth of August. The Week in Brief One match, three ducks, and the whole business conducted with commendable efficiency by Yalding's attack, Messrs Allsop, Reeves and Leney, with the Reverend Leigh doing rather more work behind the timbers than any of our batsmen managed in front of them. Mr Peach's pair stands as the day's principal ornament, the art of not scoring twice over being no mean accomplishment. Duck Hunting Season Leaderboard - Tom Peach Jnr — 2 ducks in 3 innings, 66.67% - W Peach — 2 ducks in 6 innings, 33.33% - A T Benning — 1 duck in 1 innings, 100% - F M Hills — 1 duck in 1 innings, 100% - F E Wallis — 1 duck in 2 innings, 50% The club extends its usual courteous invitation to members to attend the next fixture and, should form desert them at the crease, to consider their names duly welcomed into this most select and dubious of company.

For the week ending the 19th of July, 1902 At Boxley CC our First Eleven contributed two names to the register of the scoreless this week, each gentleman entering the exclusive company for the very first time in his career. 1st XI — away to Boxley CC F M Hills, sent in at number seven, was bowled by F Pettitt without troubling the scorer at all — a debut innings that yielded a nought, securing in one stroke both his maiden appearance for the club and his maiden failure, and placing him 71st of 324 upon the club's long and melancholy roll of honour. In this he keeps precise company with one A Barker, who managed the identical feat of a single duck in a single innings back in 1885 — a year in which that solitary failure was, remarkably, sufficient to carry off the Duck of the Year itself. A T Benning, at number ten, fell in the same match to C H Style, his own first innings for the club likewise yielding not a run, and taking his place 53rd upon the roll. He too stands level with the aforementioned Mr Barker of 1885 on a single career duck apiece — proof that a gentleman may arrive at nought by many different roads and still find agreeable company waiting for him at the destination. Two ducks, then, from a single fixture, both suffered away from home at Boxley, and both by gentlemen quite new to the fold — a baptism, one might say, conducted in the same coin twice over. Messrs Pettitt and Style will each no doubt fancy himself the more dangerous man; the Duck Club offers no opinion on the matter, only its customary thanks for services rendered. Duck Hunting Season Leaderboard 1. Tom Peach Jnr — 3 innings, 2 ducks (66.67%) 2. A T Benning — 1 innings, 1 duck (100%) 3. F M Hills — 1 innings, 1 duck (100%) 4. F E Wallis — 2 innings, 1 duck (50%) 5. W Kennard — 2 innings, 1 duck (50%) The season is yet young, and the timbers remain as inviting as ever to Boxley's bowlers and to all who venture out to face them. We await next Saturday's fixture with our customary mixture of dread and anticipation, confident that the register has by no means seen the last of its additions this year.

A single fixture only, against Town Malling CC, and but one contribution to the exclusive zero club this week — slender fare for the correspondent, yet the ledger must be kept nonetheless. The First Eleven F E Wallis, at number four, was bowled by F Longhurst and sent back to the pavilion without troubling the scorer, his first duck of the present season and the second of a career now standing at eighteen innings — a record that places him thirtieth of the three hundred and twenty gentlemen who have ever made that particular walk. He joins, on the identical career tally of two, the redoubtable Arthur Cornwallis, who between 1884 and 1901 compiled his own pair of ciphers in forty three innings and was crowned Duck of the Year in 1888. A fellowship spanning near twenty years, into which Mr Wallis is now quietly received. In Summary One match, one duck. The zero club's ranks were barely troubled this week, with only Mr Wallis answering its call. Whether this reflects Town Malling's parsimony with the ball, or merely a rare outbreak of application at the crease, the correspondent leaves entirely to the reader's own judgement. The Duck Hunting Season Leaderboard - Tom Peach Jnr — 2 innings, 2 ducks, a full 100 per cent, consistency of a most particular kind - C W Kennard — 2 innings, 1 duck, 50 per cent - F E Wallis — 2 innings, 1 duck, 50 per cent - W Kennard — 2 innings, 1 duck, 50 per cent The eleven takes the field again before long, and the ledger stands open, ready to receive whatever further offerings the willow and the leather may between them contrive.

🏏 A single fixture at Town Malling was sufficient to furnish our correspondent with material, four ciphers being registered by the 1st Eleven in the course of the visit, and a family affair to boot. 1st XI — v Town Malling CC (away) Mr Tom Peach Jnr enjoyed the rare, if unwelcome, distinction of being twice sent back to the pavilion in the one match — first at number three, bowled by W H Cooper, and later at number eight, bowled by P Phillips. Neither dismissal came off the first ball, so the gentleman was denied the full ceremony of a king's pair, but a pair it remains nonetheless, his second and first career ducks arriving in the same afternoon, a debut to remember for reasons entirely unconnected with runs. He has been proclaimed Duck of the Year for 1902 already, and now finds himself level upon a tally of two with the veteran Arthur Cornwallis, who compiled his own pair of noughts across a rather more leisurely span of years from 1884 to 1901. Messrs W Kennard and C W Kennard, brothers both, contrived between them one of the more charming curiosities the ledger has to offer this season. W Kennard, at number four, fell to W H Cooper's bowling without troubling the scorer, while C W Kennard, at number six, was accounted for by F Longhurst in like fashion. Each stands debutant to the exclusive zero club, each on a single duck from two innings, and each finds a kindred spirit in the tally of A Barker, whose own solitary duck of 1885 remains, seventeen years on, exactly matched. A Family Notice The correspondent is obliged to record a rarer ceremony still. The Messrs Kennard, being brothers, achieved the distinction of Two of a Quack — both dismissed for nought in the self-same innings against Town Malling. Such fraternal solidarity in failure is not lightly come by, and the club extends its warmest, if faintly mischievous, congratulations to the family upon this shared entry into the honours board. The Week in Brief Four ducks in a single match is respectable industry by any measure, and the 1st Eleven may reflect that consistency, of a very particular kind, was very much the order of the day at Town Malling. Mr Peach's pair alone accounts for half the tally, a feat of concentrated ill fortune not often witnessed in one fixture. Duck Hunting Season Leaderboard - Tom Peach Jnr — 2 innings, 2 ducks, 100.0% - C W Kennard — 2 innings, 1 duck, 50.0% - W Kennard — 2 innings, 1 duck, 50.0% The eleven return to the field presently, and the club has every confidence that further additions to the roll of dubious distinction will not be long delayed. Members are cordially reminded that the art of not scoring is one practised by the finest and the humblest alike, and all are welcome to try their hand.