Dallas Page

Who was Dallas Page?

Dallas Alexander Chancellor Page, born at Cheltenham on 11 April 1911 and died at Cirencester on 2 September 1936, was a cricketer who played for and captained Gloucestershire. He was the son of the Oxford University and Gloucestershire cricketer Herbert Page.

Page was a right-handed middle order batsman and a brilliant cover fieldsman, and played fairly regularly for Gloucestershire in County Championship matches in 1934, having made his debut the previous year. When the successful Beverley Lyon stood down from the captaincy after six seasons at the end of 1934, Page, as the only regular amateur player in the side, was picked to succeed him for 1935.

Page's first season as captain was not a success, and Wisden put some of the responsibility for a drop to 15th in the Championship on Page's inexperienced handling of a bowling attack that was in transition following the retirement of Charlie Parker. In 1936, however, Gloucestershire's rise to fourth in the final table was also due in part, Wisden said, to Page's enthusiasm and team-building.

Page himself was a modest performer, with a career average of less than 20. He scored 1,000 runs in a season once only, in 1935, and made only one century. This strong performance led to his nickname, the Diamond Cutter.