Alfred Atfield

Who was Alfred Atfield?

Alfred John Atfield played first-class cricket in England and South Africa and was also a Test match umpire and an influential cricket coach. He was born at Ightham, Kent, England and died at Caterham, Surrey.

A right-handed lower-order batsman and a right-arm medium-pace bowler, Atfield played for Kent's second eleven before qualifying for Gloucestershire, for whom he played three first-class matches in 1893. Those were the only competitive first-class games of his career and in the third of them, batting at No 10 in the match against Kent, Atfield scored 45, which was his highest first-class score. He was then recruited to play as a professional by the aristocratic cricket patron W. H. Laverton who ran his own country-house cricket team at Leighton House, Westbury in Wiltshire and played over the next few years in many non-first-class games alongside some of the leading amateur players of the time: Laverton himself was the father-in-law of Lionel Palairet, for example, who was often included in Laverton teams. While engaged by Laverton, he also played regularly in Minor Counties cricket for Wiltshire in the early seasons of the Minor Counties Championship.