The significance of Harry Trott
Harry Trott was a man of vision, and in 1903 he called a meeting of cricket-minded people with a view to forming a Bendigo Cricket Association with defined Boundaries. Trott proposed that teams should be drawn from within an area of 15 miles radius of the Bendigo fountain in Charing Cross. The Bendigo District Cricket Association was subsequently formed at a public meeting later in 1903. Trott was a member of the General Committee and an association selector. At the BDCA’s second annual meeting on Tuesday, October 11, 1904, Mr Harry Trott was elected President. The meeting held at the City Club Hotel, sought to strengthen the struggling association. Mr Trott was also appointed sole selector.
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Following his elevation to the position of BDCA president, Harry Trott proposed that all Bendigo cricketers should belong to just one club – Bendigo United. Trott envisaged Bendigo United becoming a multi-purpose sporting club, initially providing playing facilities for cricket, tennis, bowls and football. As membership grew, he believed swimming baths could also be erected. Trott calculated that five hundred members each paying an annual subscription of one guinea would pay for the proposed sporting facilities. The subscriptions were also to cover the cost of extending the Back Creek ground by 50 yards allowing two games to be played simultaneously on first-class turf wickets maintained by a first-class curator.
The cricket competition proposed under Trott’s radical scheme revolved around Bendigo being divided into four districts – North, South, East and West – with players tied to the district in which they lived. District teams were to be organised into graded competitions – first second and third grades, going down as far as under 16 schoolboys. Trott suggested the first grade play on turf and the lower grades on matting until more turf wickets could be established. Although Trott’s scheme was never adopted, his foresight is beyond question.
He remained playing for Bendigo United until 1909, during that time he amassed 1975 runs for the club at an average of 44.8 and took 109 wickets at an average of 14.5. In 1904 while still playing for BUCC’s he captained Victoria against an English X1. In his last big match for his State against another English side in 1908 at the age of 41 he took 5 for 116.
As noted earlier, around 1861 the club made an application to the government of the day for a grant of 6 acres of land at ‘Back Creek’, which was subsequently granted. The reserve is still the home of BUCC, and in honor of Harry Trott the ground was renamed the ‘Harry Trott Oval’ in 1991.
The cricket competition proposed under Trott’s radical scheme revolved around Bendigo being divided into four districts – North, South, East and West – with players tied to the district in which they lived. District teams were to be organised into graded competitions – first second and third grades, going down as far as under 16 schoolboys. Trott suggested the first grade play on turf and the lower grades on matting until more turf wickets could be established. Although Trott’s scheme was never adopted, his foresight is beyond question.
He remained playing for Bendigo United until 1909, during that time he amassed 1975 runs for the club at an average of 44.8 and took 109 wickets at an average of 14.5. In 1904 while still playing for BUCC’s he captained Victoria against an English X1. In his last big match for his State against another English side in 1908 at the age of 41 he took 5 for 116.
As noted earlier, around 1861 the club made an application to the government of the day for a grant of 6 acres of land at ‘Back Creek’, which was subsequently granted. The reserve is still the home of BUCC, and in honor of Harry Trott the ground was renamed the ‘Harry Trott Oval’ in 1991.