| Hartley Lobban | |
| Birth Date: | 9 May 1926 |
| Birth Place: | Jamaica |
| Death Place: | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada |
| Batting: | Right-handed |
| Bowling: | Right-arm fast |
| Columns: | 1 |
| Column1: | First-class |
| Matches1: | 17 |
| Runs1: | 81 |
| Bat Avg1: | 6.75 |
| 100S/50S1: | 0/0 |
| Top Score1: | 18 |
| Deliveries1: | 2,428 |
| Wickets1: | 47 |
| Bowl Avg1: | 30.89 |
| Fivefor1: | 4 |
| Tenfor1: | 0 |
| Best Bowling1: | 6-51 |
| Catches/Stumpings1: | 4/0 |
| Source: | http://content-uk.cricinfo.com/england/content/player/16619.html Cricinfo |
Hartley W Lobban (9 May 1926 – 15 October 2004)[1] was a Jamaican-born first-class cricketer who played 17 matches for Worcestershire in the early 1950s.
Lobban played little cricket in Jamaica. He went to England at the end of World War II as a member of the Royal Air Force, and settled in Kidderminster in Worcestershire in 1947, where he worked as a civilian lorry driver for the RAF.[2] He began playing for Kidderminster Cricket Club in the Birmingham League, and at the start of the 1952 season, opening the bowling for the club's senior team, he had figures of 7 for 9 and 7 for 37.[2]
Worcestershire invited him to play for them, and he made his first-class debut against Sussex in July 1952. He took five wickets in the match (his maiden victim being Ken Suttle) and then held on for 4 not out with Peter Richardson (20 not out) to add the 12 runs needed for a one-wicket victory after his county had collapsed from 192 for 2 to 238 for 9.[3] A week later he claimed four wickets against Warwickshire, then a few days later still he managed 6 for 52 (five of his victims bowled) in what was otherwise a disastrous innings defeat to Derbyshire. In the last match of the season he took a career-best 6 for 51 against Glamorgan; he and Reg Perks (4 for 59) bowled unchanged throughout the first innings. Worcestershire won the game and Lobban finished the season with 23 wickets at 23.69.[4]
He took 23 wickets again in 1953, but at a considerably worse average of 34.43, and had only two really successful games: against Oxford University in June, when he took 5 for 70, and then against Sussex in July. On this occasion Lobban claimed eight wickets, his most in a match, including 6 for 103 in the first innings. He also made his highest score with the bat, 18, but Sussex won by five wickets.[5]
In 1954 Lobban made only two first-class appearances, and managed only the single wicket of Gloucestershire tail-ender Bomber Wells. In his final game, against Warwickshire at Dudley, his nine first-innings overs cost 51. He bowled just two overs in the second innings as Warwickshire completed an easy ten-wicket win. Lobban played one more Second XI game, against Glamorgan II at Cardiff Arms Park; in this he picked up five wickets.
He was also a professional boxer and played rugby union for Kidderminster.[2]
He later moved to Canada, where he worked as a teacher in Burnaby, British Columbia. He and his wife Celia had a son and two daughters.[1]