After a pair on debut, Douglas led Essex and
England at
Cricket as well as winning Olympic
boxing gold before his death at sea
A century ago England were in Australia, approaching the end of the third Test and on their way to the first 5-0 series whitewashing of their history. It was a grim time for the team, weakened as they inevitably had been by the ravages of the first world war, and they would not win a Test between their last pre-war visit to
South Africa in 1914 and their first post-war trip there in 1923.
“It is obvious that cricket, like other games, has gone back a little as a result of the long period during which the war demanded the attention of so many men,” said their captain, Johnny Douglas, before they set off in 1920, though he still thought “that our prospects all around are very good indeed”.