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Levi Wright - A 'Derbyshire Double'

Levi George Wright (1862-1953)

LEVI GEORGE WRIGHT (1862-1953) is one of only 19 men to have achieved the 'Derbyshire Double' - that is, to have played at least one first team game for both Derby County Football Club and Derbyshire County Cricket Club.

He was born in Oxford on 15 January 1862, but moved to Derby to take up a teaching appointment in January 1881. His first post was as Assistant Master at St. Anne's School. By then Wright had already acquired the all-round sporting skills and innate enthusiasm which were ultimately to render him one of the best known figures in Derbyshire sport.

He quickly came to the attention of both cricket and football enthusiasts during his early days in Derby, and was soon to find himself playing at the highest level in both the 'summer' and 'winter' games.

It was as a cricketer that he displayed the better prowess. He first nailed his colours to the Napier Cricket Club - in effect a pub team - whose headquarters were at the long-since demolished 'Sir Charles Napier' in Brook Street. But he soon moved up to the better standard of the Derby Midland Club, and therefater advanced to county level.

Between 1883 and 1909 he played in 325 matches for Derbyshire, scoring 15,166 runs at a very creditable average of 26.1. He also gained a reputation for his particularly fine fielding at point.

Wright captained Derbyshire for part of 1906 and for the whole of the 1907 season, and was named Wisden 'Cricketer of the Year' in 1906.

As a footballer he began in earnest with the Derby Midland Club, making his debut in their inaugural season of 1881. He performed consistently in the half-back berth, and when Derby County were formed in 1884 Wright was invited to join their ranks. This was much to the chagrin of the Midland 'committee', for Wright was not the only 'Midlander' poached in that fashion by the up-and-coming County!

His early games for the Rams were in the pre-League period, but his four appearances in the opening Football League season of 1888-89 were more than sufficient for him to become a member of the 'Derbyshire Double' brigade. And for good measure, he managed to notch a solitary goal.

Much less is known about Levi Wright's later life, but he settled in the Normanton district of Derby and in time became the sort of 'approachable Methuselah' who would talk sport with anyone who cared to engage him. Nor did he entirely give up his active participation in ball games - he became a great enthusiast of bowls, and was still playing at the Arboretum and Normanton clubs well into his eighties.

When he died in Derby on 11 January 1953, at the age of 90, an affectionate tribute in the Derby Evening Telegraph dubbed him the 'Grand Old Man of Derbyshire Cricket'.

                                                    R.I.P. LEVI GEORGE WRIGHT - 1862 - 1953

Peter Seddon - November 2007

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County:  Derbyshire

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