Born in East Leake on 12 November 1872, Albert William Hallam moved with his family to Loughborough in 1886 or 1887 and made his debut in county cricket under a residential qualification for Leicestershire against Lancashire in May 1889. He played in one or two matches for that county each season until 1893 but only took a handful of wickets.
In 1892 he was engaged at the Oval, but in 1893 played for the Manchester club and took up residence in Lancashire with a view to appearing for that county. Hallam made his debut for Lancashire, and his First-Class debut, against MCC at Lord’s in May 1895. He had a moderate first season, the dry wickets telling against him, but the following summer he greatly improved, being second to Mold in the bowling averages for the county; taking 23-9-28-6 against Leicestershire at Liverpool, his best performance for his adopted shire. His continued success in 1897 helped Lancashire win the Championship.
In 1901 Hallam joined Nottinghamshire and made a remarkable debut, taking 21 wickets for 94 against the XXII Colts and then taking eight wickets on his Nottinghamshire First-Class debut (also against MCC at Lord's). During this summer he also took 10 wickets in a First-Class match for the first time - 10 for 171 v Surrey (Oval).
Hallam's two outstanding seasons for Nottinghamshire were 1906 and 1907; heading the county’s bowling averages in both years, he took 104 for 1,723 in 1906 and 156 for 1,901 in 1907.
He took a hat-trick v Leicestershire at Trent Bridge in 1907 as well as bowling unchanged through a complete match with Wass v Northamptonshire (Northampton) and v Derbyshire (Chesterfield).
Hallam played regularly for Nottinghamshire in 1908 - in which year he was named as one of Wisden's Cricketers of the Year - and 1909 but dropped out of the side soon after the start of the 1910 season, his last match being v Yorkshire at Trent Bridge in June. He was primarily a bowler and in more than 250 First-Class matches he only passed 50 twice, with a top score of 57, made against his first county of Lancashire. Hallam took 1,012 First- Class wickets at 19.02; his best figures were 8-63 for the North v South at Bradford in 1905.
Outside of county matches Hallam made few First-Class appearances. Injury meant he missed out selection for England v South Africa in 1907, for which he had seemed more or less certain; this was as near as he got to Test Cricket.
After a brief stint with Nelson CC in 1911 he joined Loughborough Grammar School as coach.
Albert Hallam died on 24 July 1940 in Loughborough
July 2020
Nottinghamshire First-Class Number: 267