Caps off to oldest swinger in town
QUESTION Who had the oldest international debuts in cricket, rugby and soccer?
AT 49 years and 119 days, bat swinger James Southerton became the oldest player to make a Test debut.
Eventually eschewing the bat, he became a highly proficient slow round-arm bowler, taking 1,682 first-class wickets at an average of 14.43. In 1867 he represented Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex in a single season when regulations permitted this.
The first ever Test was a twomatch series in Melbourne in 1877. In Australia’s first innings, Southerton took three wickets, but England lost the match.
In the second Test, he took four second innings wickets, which helped England win the match and tie the series 1-1.
In his retirement he was landlord of the famous Cricketers pub on Mitcham Green, South London.
The oldest international rugby union player is Mark Spencer, who was 57 years and 340 days when he represented Qatar in the Asian 5 Nations Competition vs Uzbekistan in Dubai on April 25, 2012. He was born in the U.S., but took Qatari residency, allowing him to play for the national side.
Crystal Palace goalkeeper Alec Morten was football’s oldest debutant. His date of birth is disputed as 1831 or 1832, but he could not have been younger than 41 when he captained England in their second official game, against Scotland at Kennington Oval in London in 1873. England won 4-2.
Matty Turner, Gosport, Hampshire.
QUESTION Why did Colonel Thomas Johnes plant more than three million trees in Wales?
BORN at Ludlow in 1748, Thomas Johnes was a key figure in the Picturesque movement, an aesthetic ideal to reveal ‘that peculiar kind of beauty which is agreeable in a picture’.
An MP for Carmarthenshire and colonel in the militia, he bought an estate 15 miles inland from Aberystwyth, near Cwmystwyth, called Hafod Uchtryd (meaning the summer place of Uchtryd, a former owner).
To create his personal paradise, between 1782 and 1813, Johnes planted 1,200 acres of forest. European larch and Scots pine were planted on high ground, with oak and beech on more fertile land. This amounted to at least three million trees.
A mansion was built by Bath architect Thomas Baldwin and magnificent gardens were laid out. Johnes also promoted experimental techniques in sheep and cattle breeding and the growing of new crops. He was awarded Britain’s Royal Society of Arts medal five times for his agricultural schemes. His Picturesque Eden attracted many visitors, including leading figures in science, agriculture and the arts.
In 1807, the mansion was destroyed in a fire. Johnes was in London attending parliament when he heard the news that his family had escaped. Baldwin was hired to rebuild the mansion.
He had hoped his work at Hafod would be carried on by his children, but his son died in infancy and his teenage daughter passed away during a visit to London in 1811. His health began to fail and he fell into financial difficulty. He sold the estate in 1814 and died two years later.
In the 20th century, Hafod became increasingly run down. Restoration began in the late 1980s. In 1994, the Hafod Trust was formed to lead the project in partnership with Forestry Commission Wales, now Natural Resources Wales.
More than ten miles of historical trails, bridges and historically sensitive features have been restored, including the garden and picturesque features such as the cavern cascade, rustic bridge, tunnel and mossy seat falls.
Mrs Ellen Pritchard, Aberystwyth, Ceredigion.
QUESTION Who are the best soccer managers who had mediocre playing careers?
FURTHER to the earlier answer, one of the best managers to come from these shores had a rather uneventful playing career.
Brendan Rodgers, from Carnlough, Co. Antrim, has had considerable success as a coach. He made his first major impact as a manager at Swansea City, as he guided the club to promotion from the Championship in the 2010-11 season – then delivered an impressive 11th-place finish in the Premier League the following year. What’s more, he did it while his side played a sparkling brand of passing football.
This caught the attention of Liverpool, and he became their manager in 2012.
He came within a whisker of winning the Premier League in the 2013-14 season, narrowly missing out to Manchester City. He faded out a little at the Merseyside club from there, but has since bounced back with successful stints at Celtic (where his trophy haul included two Scottish Premier League titles) and Leicester City (where he remains the manager, and has won an FA Cup).
However, his time as a player was less impressive. He played for Northern Ireland at schoolboy level, and also for his local team Ballymena United, before moving to Reading.
However, his professional career was ended by a knee condition at the age of just 20, though he did have some short spells at nonleague clubs.
Although his time as a player was brief, it did seem to influence his footballing philosophy as a manager. He later commented: ‘I played internationally for Northern Ireland as a Youth international and I always felt that at that time I spent more time without the ball, than with the ball.’
And regarding his time at Reading, he added: ‘The culture [in England] was very much long and direct and that didn’t suit me as a player. When I then had to quit football these memories stayed in my mind... So I started on a journey to try and make young players feel important and give them confidence to deal with the football.’
H Fox, Dublin 15.
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