In those days we played something like 28 CC games per season, a fine effort nonetheless & Nichols regularly did the double in the 30s often being the first to do so, a very fine bowler unlucky not to have played (more) for England but he had the likes of Larwood, Voce , Bowes & Allen to compete with.
There was a bench dedicated to Nichols at Witham CC. Wonder if it's still there?
Apparently MN was an excellent dancer - however, his bowling action has been described as flat-footed. Seemingly not as sharp as Larwood or Allen and we did have the odd good all-rounder or two at bigger clubs (e.g. Wally Hammond). Having said this, he probably was unlucky not to have played more.
Indeed the ECCC team of the 1930s bears a lot of resemblance to the ECCC team post-2017: a team comprising players of a standard seemingly not good enough to play regularly for England, but all contributing with bat and/or ball when necessary (or in the case of Farnes, when available).
In fact, probably the Pearce/Wilcox teams are closer in type than the Fletcher era - when we had at least 4 bats and 3 bowlers of clear international class. This current team has maybe 2 star bats and 2 bowlers. Controversial?
