County Championship 9th (W6, D14, L8)
Gillette Cup First round
Captain Geoff Millman
There were two significant changes in county cricket in 1963, neither of which found their way into the Notts Committee Report for the year.
Following a vote at the MCC, the distinction between ‘Amateur’ and ‘Professional’ was abolished and all players became simply ‘cricketers’.
This long overdue – which mirrored social changes in the wider world in the early 1960s – meant that the Trent Bridge Pavilion no longer had to provide separate facilities for the two factions.
Probably coincidentally, the professional Geoff Millman, wicketkeeper-batter, replaced the amateur AJ Corran as captain of Nottinghamshire CCC.
The second innovation was the introduction of a one-day limited overs competition for all counties – the Gillette Cup. In the first year, this was a 65-over competition, with straightforward knockout games from the start. Nottinghamshire’s involvement was therefore rather brief, losing to Yorkshire by four wickets at Middlesbrough.
Brian Bolus, recruited from Yorkshire, made exactly 100 against his former employers and became the first – and still the only – Notts batter to carry his bat through a completed List-A innings.
The scoring rates hardly bear inspection in light of the developments in limited-overs cricket; Notts made just 159 all out in 64 overs, Yorkshire ‘raced’ to 160-6 in 55 overs!
As the Committee Report acknowledged, Millman’s first season in charge saw an uplift in the county’s fortunes – a rise from 15th to 9th place in the Championship and six games won as opposed to four in the previous campaign.
The season did not start encouragingly, however. Five of those eight defeats came in the first seven games.
Three players made their Notts debuts in the opening draw against Northamptonshire – the Yorkshire exiles Bolus and Keith Gilhouley and Barrie Whittingham. The first two came to Trent Bridge with solid First-Class experience, the younger Barrie Whittingham, though born in Yorkshire and with a handful of games for the Tykes Second XI, was largely untried.
Middlesex’s Peter Parfitt showed a particular liking for Notts bowling, scoring more centuries – seven – against them than any other opponent. His score of exactly 100 enabled the home side to overcome a first innings deficit to win at Lord’s by 126 runs.
Ken Palmer of Somerset took a career-best 9-57 to skittle Notts for 153 at Trent Bridge but the home team held on for a draw. The Northamptonshire openers, Mick Norman and Brian Reynolds, each scored a century (152 and 124 respectively) as Northants won by 106 runs.
More ignominiously, Notts lost by six wickets to Cambridge University at Fenner’s. Led by Mike Brearley, the students dismissed Notts for just 63 in the second innings; Richard Hutton, son of Sir Len, and Tony Windows, cousin of another Yorkshire stalwart John Hampshire, shared the wickets.
A return to the Championship did not bring a change in fortune – Sussex won at Trent Bridge by 108 runs, slow left-armer Ronnie Bell taking 8-54, his best ever return.
Notts ‘improved’ on their showing against Cambridge when they travelled to The Parks to play Oxford University, losing by five wickets, not six. Ian Moore, in his debut season with Notts, made his maiden First-Class hundred – and the county’s first of the summer – with 119 but the dark blues, led by the Nawab of Pataudi, eased to victory.
There followed three successive Championship wins, all at Trent Bridge. Against Surrey, it was new players that secured a win by 115 runs; Ian Moore, 108, scored a century for the second match in a row and Gilhouley took 6-95.
Lancashire were seen off by three wickets with Brian Bolus making 100, his first century for Notts. ‘Bomber’ Wells showed a welcome return to form with twelve wickets in the 10-wicket win over Worcestershire, 7-43 and 5-106.
Eight of the next nine matches were drawn. Peter Parfitt (again) made 135 as Middlesex drew at Worksop.
The Trent Bridge faithful got a look at the value of Brian Bolus in the draw with Glamorgan – the opener making his first double hundred, 202no, that proved to be his career-best.
Maurice Hill, 100no, was the centurion for Notts in a draw against Warwickshire at Edgbaston for who Billy Ibadulla replied with 104. Bolus made only 10 in his one innings but that was enough to take him past 1,000 runs for the season.
Roy Marshall’s 104 was the highlight of the draw with Hampshire at Trent Bridge and Nottinghamshire broke the sequence of draws with a win over Lancashire, thus completing the double over the red rose county, at Old Trafford.
It was a low-scoring affair with Notts making 156 and 101 (Statham 6-33), Lancashire 65 (Davison 6-30) and 108; Ian Davison finished with match figures of 11-53 and John Cotton with 9-87.
Against Yorkshire at Trent Bridge, Trueman’s 6-51 was the standout performance but time lost meant yet another drawn match.
The loss of most of the second day meant a draw with Hampshire at Bournemouth. John Springall played his last First-Class match in the draw with Kent at Dover. He made 5,176 First-Class runs with two centuries, the highest being 107no against Leicestershire in 1959, and took 80 wickets.
Norman Hill, who had left Trent Bridge at the end of the previous season to take up an appointment with Nottinghamshire County Council, had come back to the playing staff and made a typical 134 in the draw with Derbyshire at Ilkeston.
Two home defeats followed. In the first, Essex won by 57 runs and the next visitors, Gloucestershire, won by five wickets. For Gloucester John Mortimore, very much a bowling all-rounder, scored a career-high of 149.
Left-arm quick bowler Fred Rumsey, in his first season with Somerset, took 7-39 and 6-65 (at the stage his best match analysis) in the drawn match at Taunton. Somerset, chasing 221 to win were perilously close at 204-9 when stumps were drawn.
Ron Tindall, better known as a footballer with Chelsea and West Ham, made one of two First-Class hundreds in the draw at The Oval but weather intervened and Surrey barely got their second innings under way.
Notts duly completed their second ‘double’ of the season, beating Worcestershire at Worcester by seven wickets. With no completed innings passing 200, it was a low scoring game with Martin Horton for the home side and Ian Davison each having a five-wicket haul.
There was a reverse double in the next match as Gloucestershire won at Cheltenham by 104 runs, despite Norman Hill making 129. John Mortimore reverted to his more usual role, taking 6-44 in the Notts second innings.
No play on the final day meant a draw with Yorkshire at Bradford and Notts then entertained the West Indies touring side.
The West Indies made 314 (Wells 5-89) to which Notts replied with 143 and, following-on, 306, the tourists using eight bowlers. This unremarkable draw is most notable as the final First-Class appearance of Notts legend Reg Simpson.
Reg Simpson
Reg played 27 Tests for England, with a top score of 156no in the fifth Ashes Test of 1951, at Melbourne. In all, he made 30,546 First-Class runs, 23,088 of those for Nottinghamshire, with 64 hundreds and a best of 259, also made on that 1950-51 tour of Australia, against New South Wales at Sydney.
He captained Notts between 1951-1960 and was a Wisden Cricketer of the Year in 1950. In the spring of 1961 he was elected to the Notts Committee and served for 37 years – another record to add to all those he made as a batter during his twenty years as a First-Class cricketer. After standing down from the Committee, he was made a Vice President.
In the Championship, Notts went to Ebbw Vale where they subsided to 44 all out in the second innings to leave Glamorganshire victors by three wickets. Jim Pressdee took 6-24 and 4-14 but Ian Davison must have given the home side a scare – he took 4-8 as they tottered to 65-7 in the second innings.
The heaviest defeat of an otherwise encouraging season followed. Warwickshire came to Trent Bridge and made 345, Norman Horner 108; Notts were dismissed for 168 and, following-on 136 to give the visitors victory by an innings and 41 runs. Barbados-born Rudi Webster took 7-56 in Notts second innings.
A welcome win in the last home game of the season saw Derbyshire beaten by eight wickets. Brian Bolus made 136 out of 299 for Notts, passing 2,000 runs for the season. The visitors were 77 all out and followed on, making 277; Notts made 56-2.
The last game of the summer was away to Leicestershire but rain curtailed play; only 62 overs of play were possible across the three days and the match was, inevitably, drawn.
Two of Nottinghamshire’s debutants – Ian Moore and Barrie Whittingham were among the four batters (with Bolus and Maurice Hill) to pass 1,000 runs for the season. Among the bowlers, Ian Davison stood out with 111 wickets at 21.92, closely followed by Bryan Wells with 97 at 23.77.
In the report, the Committee reflected on the loss of three great players of Nottinghamshire’s past:
“It is with much regret that we record the passing in 1963 of three former stalwarts of the County XI, viz. Arthur Carr, John Gunn and E (Ted) Alletson.
“Arthur Carr, a former Captain of the County and England, was a pugnacious batsman, who brought the same qualities of fearless aggression and uncompromising zest into his captaincy. They won him many admirers for he was a courageous leader of men, with the ability to command and return loyalty, and a natural air of authority. He led the County XI in 1929, the last occasion they won the County Championship. (He was also the first Notts player, in 1926, to captain England in a Test at Trent Bridge)
“John Gunn, a brother of George and nephew of William, was a left-arm slow bowler, a more than useful batsman and a fine cover-point. He played in six Test Matches against Australia.
“Ted Alletson will always be remembered for his record score of 189 in 90 minutes against Sussex at Hove in 1911.”
They perhaps did John Gunn poor service – his was a magnificent record and he is the most successful all-rounder in the Club’s history. He remains the only cricketer to score more than 20,000 runs and take more than 1,000 wickets for Nottinghamshire. In all First-Class cricket, he scored 24,601 runs, average 33.19, took 1,243 wickets at 24.50 runs each and held 233 catches.
March 2026
Scorecards and stats can be seen here