Schofield Haigh, the Yorkshire and England fast-medium bowler who had taken over 2,000 first-class wickets and had been the unsung partner of Hirst and Rhodes for two decades, retired from first-class cricket at the end of 1913 with worsening health. He died in 1921, his Yorkshire colleagues said, partly of grief at the war losses.
Haigh had been picked for England 11 times, taking 24 Test wickets at 25.91. His Yorkshire career produced 2,012 first-class wickets at 15.95.
Through 1912-13 his pace had dropped and his back was troubling him. He told the Yorkshire committee that 1913 would be his last season.
Haigh had been the third bowler in Yorkshire's celebrated Hirst-Rhodes-Haigh combination from the 1890s through to 1913. He played 11 Tests for England, most famously taking 11 wickets in two innings against South Africa in 1906. He was a fast-medium bowler who used the Yorkshire wickets brilliantly. By 1913 his health was suspect; he played his last full season that summer and retired at its end. Yorkshire awarded him a benefit. He worked as a coach at Winchester after retirement. His death in 1921, aged 49, was attributed to influenza by some and to general decline by others; his contemporaries believed the war losses among Yorkshire colleagues — particularly Major Booth — had broken his spirit. He stands here as one of the many secondary cricketers of the era whose careers were ended just before the war and who did not live long enough to see the post-war recovery.
1900-1910: Third bowler in the Yorkshire trio
1906: Takes 11 wickets in two innings v South Africa
1912: Yorkshire championship year
1913: Final first-class season
1895
Yorkshire debut
1906
Tests for England v South Africa
1913
Retires from first-class cricket
1921
Dies in Yorkshire aged 49
“Hirst, Rhodes and Haigh — the three names you said in one breath.”
Haigh worked as Winchester College coach until shortly before his death in 1921.
A Yorkshire and England bowler whose retirement at the end of 1913 was timed almost exactly with the world he played in.
Haigh is the often-forgotten third member of the great pre-war Yorkshire bowling unit. Without him the Hirst-Rhodes lore would be a duo, not the trio Yorkshire pride remembers.
Yorkshire v Essex
1932-06-16
On 15-16 June 1932 Herbert Sutcliffe (313) and Percy Holmes (224*) put on 555 for the first wicket against Essex at Leyton, breaking the world first-class record for any wicket and adding a layer of folklore — including a scoreboard that read 554 for several minutes and a hastily reversed declaration — that has clung to the partnership ever since.
Australia v England
1933-02-14
With the fate of the Bodyline series in the balance and England 216 for 6 chasing 340, Eddie Paynter checked himself out of a Brisbane hospital where he was being treated for acute tonsillitis, taxied to the Gabba in pyjamas and a dressing gown, and batted for nearly four hours to score 83. England drew level on first innings, won the Test by six wickets and the series 4-1.
Australia
1934-09-25
Days after the 1934 Oval Test, Bradman fell seriously ill with appendicitis that progressed to peritonitis. With antibiotics not yet available, he was given little chance of survival; his wife Jessie left Adelaide on a sea voyage to England prepared for the worst. He recovered after weeks of intensive nursing in a London nursing home and returned to first-class cricket the following Australian summer.