The English cricket team in the West Indies in 1934–35 was a cricket touring party sent to the West Indies under the auspices of the Marylebone Cricket Club for a tour lasting months in 1934–35. The team played four Test matches against the West Indian cricket team, winning one match but losing two – the first series defeat of an English side by the West Indies.
The team comprised 14 players, but less than half of them were regular Test players. It "could scarcely be regarded as representative of the full strength of England", Wisden Cricketers' Almanack reported in its 1936 edition coverage of the tour.[1] By contrast, the West Indies side had developed since its disappointing tour of England in 1933. In Martindale, Constantine and Hylton it had a trio of high-class fast bowlers, and Jackie Grant was an experienced captain not given to the eccentricities that the England captain Wyatt inflicted on his team.
The team consisted of 14 players, including two wicketkeepers. The party was:
Of the 14, only six had appeared in the Test matches against the Australians in the previous English cricket season. These six were Wyatt, Ames, Farnes, Hammond, Hendren and Leyland. Harbord had not played any first-class cricket in 1934 and only a dozen matches in the previous five years, Townsend did not play for a first-class county side, though he had had some success for Oxford University, and Farrimond was Lancashire's second-choice wicketkeeper, though he had played Test cricket in South Africa in 1930–31. In the event, Harbord and Farrimond played only four matches each on the tour.
The 1933 West Indies team in England lost two of the three Test matches by an innings, and won only five first-class matches across a hot and sunny summer. The tour was disappointing: "The team did not play as well as we in this country had been led to believe they would", wrote Wisden in a critical report.[2] Exceptions to the criticism of the team included captain Jackie Grant, batsman George Headley, who had averaged 66 runs per innings in making 2320 first-class runs in the season, and fast bowler Manny Martindale, who took 103 wickets at less than 21 runs apiece.
The 1933 experience may have led the MCC to underestimate the West Indies side it would face in the Caribbean. In addition, the previous Test-playing tour to the West Indies in 1929–30 had seen a very unsettled home side, with each community selecting the team for its Test match and little continuity in the side.
By contrast, the 1934–35 West Indies side had a stable core of seven or eight players who played in all or most of the Tests. Grant remained as an experienced captain; Headley led the batting; Martindale was joined by a second fast bowler in Leslie Hylton and backed up by Learie Constantine, who had been available for only a few matches on the 1933 tour because of a Lancashire League commitment.
The tour followed the itinerary of the previous Test-playing MCC tour in 1929–30, with four Tests arranged in the main cricket-playing territories in the West Indies: Barbados, Trinidad, British Guiana, and Jamaica. The Tests were each scheduled for four days.
Rain was the principal factor in a low-scoring match on a treacherous surface. Wyatt put the West Indies in on a rain-affected pitch and Farnes took four wickets for 15 runs as half the side were out for 31. George Headley rallied the team with 44 before being run out, but Paine and Hollies finished the innings off. England in turn collapsed to 81 for five by the end of the first day. Overnight rain then saturated the wicket to such an extent that play could not resume until after tea on the second day, and then, after Leslie Hylton took two wickets in the first over, Wyatt declared 21 runs behind. West Indies captain Jackie Grant shuffled his batting order in the hope the pitch would ease, but three wickets fell for four runs before Hylton and Cyril Christiani played out time on the second day. A further overnight deluge made play impossible until 3.30 on the third day. West Indies then lost three more wickets in adding 18 runs and Grant declared, setting England just 73 to win. Wyatt also rejigged his batting order with the aim that his tail-enders might blunt the West Indies attack. The move did not work, but Hammond with an unbeaten 29 and Hendren with 20 saw England through to victory. Manny Martindale took five second innings wickets for 22 runs.
Wyatt again won the toss and put the West Indies in, but innings of 92 from Derek Sealy and of 90 from Learie Constantine led to a respectable total. England lost their first five wickets for 23 runs to the West Indies fast bowlers. Hendren and Iddon put on 71, then Iddon and Holmes made 74 together, and Holmes, who made 85, put on 62 with Farrimond. West Indies' second innings was a determined effort with 93 from Headley and contributions from almost all the other batsmen. England were set 325 to win and Wyatt – in what Wisden termed an "amazing and inexplicable course"[3] – all but reversed the batting order. Five wickets fell before tea on the last day and the innings was over with one ball of the day remaining with Leyland and Holmes the last pair.
Wyatt won the toss again and batted after a start delayed by rain. Subdued batting, in which Paine, sent in as nightwatchman top-scored with 49, meant that the total only reached 198 by tea on the second day. An England collapse followed, but West Indies also batted slowly, with the exception of Headley. Hollies took seven wickets for 50 runs. England, with 71 from the captain, failed to force the pace in the second innings and the declaration left West Indies just two hours to make 203. When early wickets fell, the attempt was given up.
West Indies set a record for their highest Test score against England and Headley's 270 not out was the highest individual score for the West Indies. Headley shared partnerships of 202 with Sealy for the third wicket and of 147 for the seventh wicket with Rolph Grant. When England batted, Martindale inflicted a compound fracture of the jaw on Wyatt and four other wickets fell for 26 runs. Ames, with 126, turned the innings around with Iddon, who made 54, but England followed on 264 behind. Against Martindale and Constantine, there was limited resistance and the match ended soon after lunch on the fourth day.
The MCC team played eight other first-class matches of three days' duration, two each against the four main cricketing territories, each set of two games preceding the Test match in the same venue. The touring side won only one of these games, the second match in British Guiana, but they were not beaten in any, though more than once they were close to defeat when the game ended.