Full name Mary Edith Hide Name Molly Hide Batting style Right-handed Role Cricket Player | Bowling style Right arm medium Education University of Reading National side England | |
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Born 24 October 1913 ( 1913-10-24 ) Shanghai, China Test debut 28 December 1934 v Australia women Last Test 27 July 1954 v New Zealand women Died September 10, 1995, Guildford, United Kingdom | ||
Mary ("Molly") Edith Hide (24 October 1913 – 10 September 1995) was an English cricketer. She was one of the great early women cricketers in England, and captained England for 17 years. In 1973 she was president of the Women's Cricket Association.
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Early life
Molly Hide was born in Shanghai, China and came to England at the age of six. She learned to play cricket at the girls' school of Wycombe Abbey and later studied agriculture at Reading University.
Career
Hide represented Worcestershire in representative matches in 1932 and 1933 and toured Australia and New Zealand with Betty Archdale's first English women touring team to those countries. She scored a hundred in the Christchurch Test, where England defeated New Zealand in a one-sided match.
Hide was given the captaincy of the South of England team in 1936 and, one year later, that of England against the touring Australian women. The series ended 1-1, Hide's major contribution was 5 for 20 in the second innings at Blackpool where England won by 25 runs.
During World War II, she worked in her father's farm in Haslemere. Test cricket resumed after 11 years with a tour of Australia which England lost 0-1. Hide scored 63 & 124* in the drawn match at Sydney. She scored five hundreds in the tour including one in Colombo. She also captained England at home against Australia in 1951 and New Zealand in 1954. Hide was a quick scoring right-handed batsman and bowled medium-paced off-spinners.
In her youth she also played lacrosse for England and was thus a dual international for England. Hide never married.
According to G. D. Martineau,