Arthur Gilligan - Cricket at Cambridge

Cricket At Cambridge

Following the war, Cambridge University suffered from a lack of quality bowling at the start of the 1919 cricket season. Consequently, Gilligan faced little competition for his place in the team and took 32 wickets at an average of under 27 in Cambridge matches, which critics considered a poor return. He made a bigger impression when, batting at number eleven in the order, he scored 101 against Sussex and shared a last-wicket partnership of 177 in 65 minutes with John Naumann. A few days later, Gilligan won his blue—the awarding of the Cambridge "colours" to sportsmen—by appearing in the University Match against Oxford. On the last day of the three-day match, he took five wickets for 16 runs in 57 deliveries to finish with bowling figures of six for 52 (six wickets taken for 52 runs conceded). According to Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, this was the best bowling performance in the University Match for many years, although Cambridge lost the match. Towards the end of the season, Gilligan played three first-class matches for Surrey and made a further appearance in a festival game, although he accomplished little with bat or ball. In all first-class games in 1919, he scored 231 runs at a batting average of 17.76 and took 35 wickets at 31.57. At the end of the season, he changed counties; his family connections in the area, and the presence of his brother Harold in the team, led him to register with Sussex.

Gilligan retained his position in the Cambridge team in 1920 and once more played against Oxford. In the University Match, he was ineffective with the ball as the damp conditions did not suit his style of bowling. At the end of the Cambridge term, Gilligan, playing as an amateur, made his Sussex debut. The Times later commented that in 1920, Gilligan was "known as a fast but unreliable bowler, a dashing and vulnerable batsman and a mid-off without his equal in England". Wisden commented on his 1920 performance: " remained stationary, doing nothing out of the common either as bowler or batsman for Cambridge, and proving a decidedly expensive bowler for Sussex". In all first-class cricket, he scored 624 runs at an average of 17.33 and took 81 wickets at 23.55. Subsequently, Gilligan left Cambridge and joined Gilbert Kimpton & Co., a general produce merchants in London in which his father was a senior partner.