Gideon Holgate

Who was Gideon Holgate?

Gideon Holgate was an English first-class cricketer, who played twelve matches for Yorkshire County Cricket Club, and several more for Lancashire between 1865 and 1867. Although there are several players who have done this, Holgate is unusual because he played for both rivals in two consecutive seasons.

Born in Sawley, Barnoldswick, then in Yorkshire, England, Holgate was a wicket-keeper, standing 5ft. 7 inches tall and weighing 11 stone, he took 24 catches and completed 10 stumpings. He scored 455 runs as a right-handed middle order batsman, at an average of 13.78, with a top score of 65 against Surrey.

A professional, his first match for Lancashire was the County Club's second ever game against Birkenhead Park, at Birkenhead, on 15 and 16 July 1864. Batting at number 10 he scored 10 and a duck, took a catch and made a stumping. The following year he was playing for Yorkshire. In 1866, he played for both counties, as he did in the following year, when he played for Lancashire against Yorkshire on 20-22 June at Whalley, in the first Roses Match. By September in the third match between the two counties, at Middlesbrough, he played for Yorkshire.

He played for both counties again the following year, and in 1868 took a season playing for the United England Eleven, playing against local twenty-twos, and in other matches against odds.