Cecil George Pepper (15 September 1916 – 22 March 1993) was an Australian first-class

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by str ...

er who became a professional in English league cricket and later a first-class

umpire An umpire is an official in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The term derives from the Old French nonper, ''non'', "not" and ''per'', ...

in England. An allrounder, he was the first to complete the

double A double is a look-alike or doppelgänger; one person or being that resembles another. Double, The Double or Dubble may also refer to: Film and television * Double (filmmaking), someone who substitutes for the credited actor of a character * ...

twice in the

Central Lancashire League The Central Lancashire Cricket League (CLCL) was a fifteen team cricket league, traditionally based in Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire. It was then based in Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire. The league ran competitions at Fir ...

. He once scored 38 runs off an eight-ball over.

Cricket career

Cec Pepper played first-class cricket for

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

from 1938–39 to 1940–41. He fought in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

in the Middle East and

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, and at the end of the war he played for

Australian Services cricket team The Australian Services XI was a cricket team comprising solely military service personnel during World War II. They became active in May 1945 after the defeat of Nazi Germany. The team played matches against English cricket sides of both milita ...

s in England (the "

Victory Tests The Victory Tests were a series of cricket matches played in England from 19 May to 22 August 1945, between a combined Australian Services XI and an English national side. The first match began less than two weeks after the end of World War II i ...

" series) in 1945 and in India, Ceylon and Australia in 1945–46. Career highlights included an innings he played for New South Wales at

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Queensland, and the third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of approximately 2.6 million. Brisbane lies at the centre of the South ...

in 1940–41 when he made 81 with all but 7 of them coming in boundaries. His only century came when he hit 168 in 146 minutes, with 17 fours and 6 sixes, for the Australian Services XI against H.D.G. Leveson-Gower's XI at Scarborough in 1945. His best bowling figures of 6 for 33 came in 1949–50 when touring India with a Commonwealth side. He took a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three wic ...

in the match. He played only two first-class matches after that tour, spending the rest of his career as a professional in league cricket. Pepper became embroiled in a row that is widely believed to have cost him Test selection. Teammates

Keith Miller Keith Ross Miller (28 November 1919 – 11 October 2004) was an Australian Test cricketer and a Royal Australian Air Force pilot during World War II. Miller is widely regarded as Australia's greatest ever all-rounder. His ability, irreverent m ...

and Dick Whitington regarded him as one of the best

all rounder An all-rounder is a cricketer who regularly performs well at both batting and bowling. Although all bowlers must bat and quite a handful of batsmen do bowl occasionally, most players are skilled in only one of the two disciplines and are consi ...

s in the world and a certainty for Australian Test selection. Pepper appealed for

leg before wicket Leg before wicket (lbw) is one of the ways in which a batsman can be dismissed in the sport of cricket. Following an appeal by the fielding side, the umpire may rule a batter out lbw if the ball would have struck the wicket but was instead in ...

against Australian captain Don Bradman in a match against South Australia. The appeal was turned down and Pepper complained to the umpire, prompting Bradman, who was also a member of the Australian Board, to lodge a complaint about Pepper. Pepper was subsequently never selected for Australia.Pollard (1988), p. 372. Cricket historian

Gideon Haigh Gideon Clifford Jeffrey Davidson Haigh (born 29 December 1965) is an English-born Australian journalist and non-fiction author who writes about sport (especially cricket), business and crime in Australia. He was born in London, was raised in Ge ...

said that " eam manager Keith

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was clearly upset by the affair, and also by the failure of the ationalselection panel radman among themnbsp;... to send Pepper, second only to Miller as a cricketer in the Services XI, to

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" in 1945–46.Haigh and Frith, pp. 98–99. Johnson tried to intercede on Pepper's behalf to no avail, although the other board members claimed that no directive had been given to the selectors to exclude Pepper.

Garry Sobers Sir Garfield St Aubrun Sobers, (born 28 July 1936), also known as Sir Gary or Sir Garry Sobers, is a former cricketer who played for the West Indies between 1954 and 1974. A highly skilled bowler, an aggressive batsman and an excellent fielder, ...

, who played against him in league cricket, said of Pepper that "the reason why he never played county cricket was probably because of his overripe language. He was certainly good enough as a cricketer but no one wanted to take the chance ... It is said that Sir Don Bradman once remarked that had Cec's mouth and his attitude been different, he would have been one of the greatest all-rounders the world has ever seen." After retiring he became an umpire in county cricket from 1964 until 1980. He remained in England and died in 1993 in Lancashire. His ''

Wisden ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

'' obituary noted that "A ''

Manchester Evening News The ''Manchester Evening News'' (''MEN'') is a regional daily newspaper covering Greater Manchester in North West England, founded in 1868. It is published Monday–Saturday; a Sunday edition, the ''MEN on Sunday'', was launched in February 20 ...

'' correspondent said he could not imagine any match involving Pepper pursuing a peaceful course", but added that usually "there was more humour than anger".

Personal life

During his early years as a professional cricketer in the Lancashire leagues, Pepper was the highest-paid cricketer in England. He established a successful packaging business in Bury in Lancashire, and bought residences in Blackpool and the south of Spain. Pepper married Maurine Ford in

Wagga Wagga Wagga Wagga (; informally called Wagga) is a major regional city in the Riverina region of New South Wales, Australia. Straddling the Murrumbidgee River, with an urban population of more than 56,000 as of June 2018, Wagga Wagga is the state's la ...

in October 1943. They had a son in England in November 1946. Pepper had an affair in England in 1944 that led to the birth of a son in 1945. Maurine divorced him in 1948 on the grounds of adultery and returned to Australia, where she remarried in 1952. Pepper did not remarry, but he and a married woman had a son in October 1964. Pepper died of heart disease in Littleborough, Lancashire, in March 1993. He left his estate, worth £135,000, divided equally between his third son and a woman he had known for only a few months.Piesse, p. 171.

References

Sources

* Haigh, Gideon; Frith, David (2007) ''Inside story: unlocking Australian cricket's archives'', Southbank, Victoria: News Custom Publishing. .

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Pepper, Cec 1916 births 1993 deaths Australian Services cricketers Australian Army personnel of World War II New South Wales cricketers Commonwealth XI cricketers Australian cricket umpires Australian emigrants to England Australian Army soldiers Dominions cricketers D. G. Bradman's XI cricketers

Cricket career

Personal life

See also

References

Sources

External links