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Victor Norbury

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Victor Norbury
Personal information
Full name
Duncan Victor Norbury
Born(1887-08-03)3 August 1887
Bartley, Hampshire, England
Died23 October 1972(1972-10-23) (aged 85)
Sutton, Surrey, England
BattingRight-handed
BowlingRight-arm slow
Domestic team information
YearsTeam
1905–1906Hampshire
1910–1913Northumberland
1919–1922Lancashire
Career statistics
Competition First-class
Matches 26
Runs scored 806
Batting average 19.19
100s/50s 1/4
Top score 100
Balls bowled 1,737
Wickets 30
Bowling average 33.20
5 wickets in innings –
10 wickets in match –
Best bowling 4/28
Catches/stumpings 8/–
Source: Victor Norbury at ESPNcricinfo
18 June 2009
Association football career
Position(s) Full-back
Youth career
Bartley
Brockenhurst
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
1905–1907 Southampton 3 (0)
1907 Bartley Cross ? (?)
1908–? North Shields ? (?)
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Duncan Victor Norbury (3 August 1887 – 23 October 1972) was an English sportsman who played football and first-class cricket. In football, Norbury most notably played in the Southern Football League for Southampton. His first-class cricket career had a greater longevity, with Norbury playing eitherside of the First World War for Hampshire and Lancashire. He had a prominent career as a professional cricketer in the North West of England playing in the Lancashire League, mostly with East Lancashire Cricket Club.

Early life and sporting career

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Norbury was born in August 1887 at Bartley, Hampshire. A product of Bartley Cricket Club, where he batted with success,[1] Norbury made his debut in first-class cricket for Hampshire against Worcestershire at Worcester in the 1905 County Championship, with him making a further eight appearances that season. He followed these up with two appearances in the 1906 County Championship against Yorkshire and Leicestershire.[2] In his eleven matches for Hampshire, he scored 179 runs at an average of 10.52, with a highest score of 35.[3] With his slow bowling, he took 7 wickets with best figures of 2 for 48.[4]

Concurrent to his first-class cricket with Hampshire, Norbury played football for Southampton as a full-back in the 1905–06 Southern Football League.[5] Prior to playing for Southampton, he had played in the New Forest for Bartley and later Brockenhurst.[6] Norbury spent most of his football career in the reserves, but made his debut for the first team as a replacement at left-back for Horace Glover away to Brentford on 29 September 1906. Norbury retained his place for the next match, in a 5–1 victory at home to Millwall. This was Southampton's first win of the season (having managed only two draws in their first five matches); despite this, Norbury lost his place back to Glover and made only one further first-team appearance, taking over from Jack Eastham at right-back at home to Clapton Orient on 16 February 1907.[7] In the summer of 1907, he turned out for his local village team, Bartley Cross, but broke his leg, thus preventing him from playing cricket that summer.[6]

Move to the North of England

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A professional cricketer, Norbury moved north in 1908 to play for as the professional for Backworth Cricket Club near Newcastle-upon-Tyne, where he was also their groundsman.[8] In November 1908, he signed to play football for North Shields, having already played a trial match for Newcastle during that season.[9] From 1910 to 1913, he was the professional for Northumberland in minor counties cricket, making 24 appearances in the Minor Counties Championship.[10] Norbury left Backworth at the end of the 1911 season to join East Lancashire Cricket Club in the Lancashire League for the 1912 season,[11] who he played for until the beginning of the First World War. Norbury served in the war, being commissioned into the East Lancashire Regiment as a second lieutenant in October 1915,[12] with promotion to lieutenant following in July 1917.[13] He was wounded in action on the Western Front in late 1917, when he fell victim to a German gas attack.[14] He resigned his commission in December 1920, following the end of the war.[15]

After the war, he resumed playing for East Lancashire Cricket Club in the Lancashire League. Following the resumption of first-class cricket, Norbury made his debut for Lancashire against Derbyshire at Old Trafford in the 1919 County Championship.[2] Having passed a medical to play, he scored a half century and took five wickets across the match.[16] Following his next match against Middlesex, Norbury found himself absent from the Lancashire side until late June following an attack of rheumatism.[17] At the end of June, he made what would be his only first-class century, when he scored exactly 100 against Surrey.[18] Having made eight County Championship appearances in 1919, Norbury would not play against for Lancashire until the 1922 County Championship, when he made a further six appearances.[2] In total, he made fourteen first-class appearances for Lancashire, scoring 594 runs at an average of 25.82;[3] with the ball, he took 23 wickets at a bowling average of 19.47, with best figures of 4 for 28.[4]

He continued to play for East Lancashire until 1924, when he asked, to the surprise of many, for the East Lancashire committee to release him from his contract.[19] He subsequently joined the Yorkshire-based Keighley Cricket Club for the 1925 season,[20] though his engagement there lasted just one season, with Norbury signing for Church Cricket Club back in the Lancashire League for the 1926 season.[21] He left Church at the end of the 1927 season, to play as an amateur for Blackpool Cricket Club for the 1928 season.[22] Three years later, he signed as a professional in the Bolton League for Westhoughton,[23] before rejoining East Lancashire halfway through 1932 as their professional for the season; whom he had previously scored over 7,000 runs and taken over 1,000 wickets.[24] At the end of the 1932 season, he joined Lancashire League club Crompton,[25] before being re-engaged by Blackpool midway through the 1934 season as their professional.[26] The following year, he made a final appearance in first-class cricket, when he played for Sir Lindsay Parkinson XI's against Leicestershire at Blackpool in 1935.[2]

Norbury later returned south, where he was employed by 1960 as the manager of a wallpaper company in South Norwood.[27] He died at Sutton in October 1972.[5] His brother-in-law, Henry Smoker, also played cricket for Hampshire and football for Southampton.[28]

References

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  1. ^ "Cricket". Southampton Observer and Hampshire News. Southampton. 22 July 1905. p. 2. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  2. ^ a b c d "First-Class Matches played by Victor Norbury". CricketArchive. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  3. ^ a b "First-Class Batting and Fielding For Each Team by Victor Norbury". CricketArchive. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  4. ^ a b "First-Class Bowling For Each Team by Victor Norbury". CricketArchive. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  5. ^ a b "Victor Norbury". www.saintsplayers.co.uk. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  6. ^ a b Holley, Duncan; Chalk, Gary (1992). The Alphabet of the Saints. Leicester: ACL & Polar Publishing. p. 256. ISBN 0951486233.
  7. ^ Chalk, Gary; Holley, Duncan (1987). Saints – A complete record. Peterborough: Breedon Books. pp. 40–41. ISBN 0907969224.
  8. ^ "Cricket". Morpeth Herald. 9 May 1908. p. 7. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  9. ^ "New football players for North Shields". Shields Daily News. Tynemouth. 17 November 1908. p. 3. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  10. ^ "Minor Counties Championship Matches played by Victor Norbury". CricketArchive. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  11. ^ "To leave Northumberland". Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette. 24 July 1911. p. 5. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  12. ^ "No. 29364". The London Gazette. 12 November 1915. p. 11215.
  13. ^ "No. 30370". The London Gazette (Supplement). 6 November 1917. p. 11546.
  14. ^ "What our soldier sportsmen are doing". Thomson's Weekly News. Dundee. 1 December 1917. p. 12. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  15. ^ "No. 32146". The London Gazette (Supplement). 30 November 1917. p. 11900.
  16. ^ "Norbury's fine display at Old Trafford". Lancashire Evening Post. Fulwood. 19 May 1919. p. 3. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  17. ^ "Lancashire League players in county action". Lancashire Evening Post. Fulwood. 27 June 1919. p. 4. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  18. ^ "Surrey v Lancashire, County Championship 1919". CricketArchive. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  19. ^ "Norbury surprise". Athletic News. Manchester. 25 August 1924. p. 3. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  20. ^ "Keighley's new professional". Halifax Evening Courier. 10 September 1924. p. 5. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  21. ^ "Norbury for Church". Athletic News. Manchester. 6 July 1925. p. 2. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  22. ^ "Norbury to play for Blackpool". Accrington Observer and Times. 3 March 1928. p. 7. Retrieved 4 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  23. ^ "Victor Norbury". Lancashire Evening Post. Fulwood. 24 February 1931. p. 10. Retrieved 5 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  24. ^ "Victor Norbury rejoins East Lancs". Lancashire Evening Post. Fulwood. 7 July 1932. p. 9. Retrieved 5 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  25. ^ "Norbury signs for Crompton". Todmorden Advertiser and Hebden Bridge Newsletter. Todmorden. 25 November 1932. p. 3. Retrieved 5 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  26. ^ "Blackpool surprise". Lancashire Evening Post. Fulwood. 28 July 1934. p. 3. Retrieved 5 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  27. ^ "Job adverts". Sutton & Epsom Advertiser. London. 17 March 1960. p. 3. Retrieved 5 February 2024 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  28. ^ The Alphabet of the Saints. pp. 316–317.
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