THE MEN FOR ALL SEASONS
Nicola Rippon on a Derbyshire sporting dynasty which hit the heights for both club and country
IN August 1936, as Derbyshire drove on towards what is still the only County Cricket Championship title in the club’s history, a key member of their team had one eye on the forthcoming football season.
Remarkably, while still a regular first-class cricketer, Harry Storer had managed Coventry City to promotion from the Third Division South.
As he helped Derbyshire close in on the cricket crown, Storer also had to prepare his football team for their first season back in the Second Division.
It was a duel task for which he was well prepared.
Harry Storer had not only played both games professionally himself, but he also came from a remarkable Derbyshire sporting family that could number England caps at both soccer and cricket among its achievements.
Although born in Liverpool, Harry Storer had the sturdiest Derbyshire pedigree imaginable. His father, Harry senior, was a Ripley man who played football for Derby Midland and cricket for the county.
His uncle, William, played for Derby County and cricket for Derbyshire and England. Harry junior played for both clubs, won England caps at football and later managed the Rams to a league title.
Born on February 2, 1898, Harry junior began his football career with Ripley Town before moving to Eastwood Town and then making one appearance for Notts County at the end of the First World War.
He had trials at Millwall but Grimsby Town signed him in 1919. Two years later he was transferred to Derby County for the thensignificant transfer fee of £4,500.
Harry joined the Rams as a winghalf and, indeed, it was in that position that he made most of his 274 appearances for Derby. But in 1923-4, the Rams moved him to the forward line and he responded with 24 League goals, including four in one game.
He caught the eyes of the England selectors and, at the end of the season, won the first of two international caps, scoring in a 3-1 win against France in Paris.
Storer moved to Burnley in 1929. Two years later he became manager of Coventry City. In 1935-36, as he guided the Sky Blues to the Southern Section title, while his Derbyshire batting colleague, Charlie Elliott, played a dozen games for City.
As an opening bat, Storer played for Derbyshire from 1920 to 1936, scoring 13,513 (average 27.63) with 18 centuries. He also took more than 200 wickets. In 1929, he shared an opening stand of 332 (with Joe Bowden) against Essex at Derby – a Derbyshire record that stood until 2017. Storer made 209 himself.
His involvement in the 1936 County Championship-winning side, 82 years ago, helped ensure his place in Derbyshire sporting legend.
After Coventry, Storer managed Birmingham City to the Second Division championship in 1947-8 and returned to Derby County as manager in 1955, taking them to the Third Division North title in only his second season. He retired in 1962.
Harry Storer was a typically bluntspeaking Derbyshire man. As a cricketer he played in a team that had its fair share of such characters. As a footballer manager, he was to be feared – not least because any Derby player wanting to know why he was not in the team had first to get past Billy, Storer’s fierce-looking dog, who sat guard outside the manager’s door.
Storer was apparently well read; he could quote Shakespeare as well as call the proverbial spade a spade. He was a mentor to future Derby managers, Brian Clough and Peter Taylor; whenever their Middlesbrough team played the Rams, they would seek out Storer and sit listening to him until the small hours.
Harry Storer died in Derby on September 1, 1967, a few weeks after Clough had taken over at the Baseball Ground.
His father, Harry senior, was born at Ripley on July 24, 1870, one of four sons of a choirmaster, all of whom served their apprenticeship at the Butterley Company. He, too, played for Ripley Town before joining Derby Midland in 1888 and then Derby County in 1891, although he never appeared in the Rams’ first team. He moved to Gainsborough Trinity and Loughborough Town before joining Woolwich Arsenal in May 1894.
The following year, Storer senior became the first Arsenal player to be selected to represent the Football League.
But in November 1895, after 41 senior appearances for the Gunners, he was suspended for a breach of discipline and transferred to Liverpool. That season he won the Second Division with the Anfield club, and in 1898-99 helped Liverpool establish the best defensive record in the top flight of English football when they finished runners-up to Aston Villa. He played his last game for Liverpool on Christmas Day, 1899, fittingly at Derby. He died on April 25, 1908 at Holloway.
In the 1896 cricket season, Harry senior represented Derbyshire six times, scoring 35 runs and taking three wickets. But there was already a member of the Storer family at the club – his brother William – who would become one of the county’s
greatest players. William Storer, born at Butterley on January 25, 1867, was a man of considerable character. In his later years his nephew, Harry, would recall that William was “a generous man, but no respecter of persons. He couldn’t stand snobbery… and he didn’t like to be messed around” – an assessment reinforced by an incident during his wicketkeeping days.
When ordered by his captain to run after a ball heading for the boundary, Storer refused: “I’m not all dressed up like a dog’s dinner to chase bloody cricket ball…. you go!” That the skipper did just that, and that Derbyshire’s committee gave Storer only the slightest rebuke, did much to illustrate their appreciation of his worth to the club.
When William Storer made his Derbyshire debut in 1887, the club was about to lose its first-class status, and when he represented MCC, the North of England and Arthur Shrewsbury’s England XI – all against the Australians – and the Players against the Gentlemen, it was during a period when his county had only second-class status.
By the time Derbyshire did return to the top level, in 1895, the club knew that Storer would be a vital asset who it could not afford to lose.
But there was little in his very early career to suggest William Storer might become the great player he did. On his first-class debut for Derbyshire, against Lancashire in 1887, he was cleanbowled first ball.
His next 10 innings produced four ducks and his batting average for that first season did not reach double figures. The next season, it struggled to just over six.
But Storer’s wicketkeeping skills kept him in the team and his batting
Brian Clough and Peter Taylor, whenever their Middlesbrough team played the Rams, they would seek out Storer
soon improved. In 1896, against Yorkshire at Derby, Storer scored 100 and 100 not out; in the next games he scored 142 against Leicestershire at Grace Road and 122 against Yorkshire at Bramall Lane – four centuries in seven days. In 1897-98, he was selected for MCC’s tour to Australia. He played in all five Tests, averaging 23.11, holding eight catches and taking six wickets. In all first-class games in Australia, he scored 604 runs at an average of over 37.
In 1899, he scored a remarkable unbeaten 216 against Leicestershire at Chesterfield. This could have been even higher, had last man Bill Bestwick arrived at the ground in time to take to the crease.
By the time he retired in 1905, William Storer had scored 1,000 runs in each of seven seasons, hit 17 centuries, become the first professional to score two centuries in the same match, and played in six Tests. In total he had scored almost 13,000 runs at an average of nearly 30. With 376 catches and 55 stumpings, not to mention 232 wickets as a leg-spin bowler, it is easy to see why William Storer is recognised as one of Derbyshire’s greats.
He would later claim that he was never nervous when batting because Derbyshire had selected him only for his wicketkeeping.
Remarkably, like his brother and nephew, William Storer was also an excellent footballer. He played 27 times for Derby County’s first team, appearing in each of the five forward positions.
William Storer died at Derby on February 28, 1912. Eight years later, his nephew, Harry, was embarking on a Derbyshire career that would peak with the county’s greatest success.