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"And gentlemen in England now a-bed ...

Daily Telegraph (newspaper)

...Shall think themselves accursed they were not here, And Hold their manhoods cheap while any speaks That fought with us upon St Crispin's Day !" Shakespeare, "Henry V", Act IV, Scene III. Well, not quite ... but not entirely an invalid comparison. These are members of the Gentlemen of Worcestershire Cricket Club (still extant), who played a three-match series against a German selection in 1937. This strange event was prompted by German cricket enthusiast Felix Menzel, who somehow managed to persuade the Nazi authorities to allow him to invite an English cricket team to play a series against his selection. In spite of the fact that Hitler (who had witnessed the game being played by British prisoners during WW1) thought the game too sedate and non-combative for Germans - pity he could not have witnessed the play of Lillee and Tommo), Menzel managed to persuade the Nazi authorities that such a series would be desirable. Nobody knows how; perhaps it had something to do with the low profile of the Sports Ministry by 1937. There were reservations on the British side as well; the Foreign Office seems to have hinted (in the most polite way) that it would be unfortunate if the Gentlemen were to lose a match. They need not have worried on that score; the Gentlemen of Worcestershire hammered the Germans in all three matches. They were, however, taken aback by the conditions in which they had to play. Instead of the standard English large field with manicured wickets, this series was played on a football pitch, with grass too long for cricket, and with crude mats for wickets. Also, the behavior of the German players left a lot to be desired, by British standards. They were given to appealing for batsmen to be "out" on the least excuse, and the German captain (a card-carrying Nazi) tended to respond to a dropped catch by punching the "culprit". Not Cricket, thought the Gentlemen and, to be fair, most of their modern successors would agree. More generally, while they appreciated the warm welcome afforded to them by the German authorities (they stayed in the iconic Adlon Hotel, Berlin, and were entertained by officials up to the level of Sports Minister), the Gentlemen were unnerved by the general symptoms of Naziism that they could not fail to observe around them. Members of the tour were, it appears, reluctant to speak about their experiences in Germany outside their family circles. A number of them went on to fight their former sporting opponents in WW2. English author Dan Waddell has just published a book on the Tour, titled "Field of Shadows - the Remarkable Story of the English Cricket Tour of Nazi Germany, 1937". I look forward to reading it. Best regards, JR.