County Championship 15th (W4, D11, l13)
Gillette Cup Second Round
Captain Geoff Millman
To slip back to 15th place in the table after reaching ninth in 1963 was disappointing particularly as the weather – apart from the Trent Bridge Test – was blameless.
The batting was especially frustrating with only two players – Brian Bolus and Maurice Hill – reaching 1,000 runs for the season and just three First-Class hundreds made by Notts batters.
With the ball, things were better – though not at the levels needed to maintain a higher position in the table. Ian Davison took the most wickets, 82, and Keith Gilhouley and Carlton Forbes each took more than 50 wickets; Forbes finished top of the Nottinghamshire averages, with 53 wickets at 17.92, and seventh in the national averages.
The Gillette Cup, reduced to a 60-over competition, saw Notts enter, and depart, at the second round but it was a very tense finish. Notts made 215 all out, Maurice Hill 107, in 58.2 overs. Somerset’s reply was teetering but 215-9 at the close of their innings was enough to give the home side victory by losing fewer wickets.
As one of the pre-season matches, Notts played a 25-over match against Cambridgeshire at Trent Bridge. It was not exactly a precursor of the T20 games to come – Cambridge scored 84-4 off their 25 overs and Notts won by 10 wickets, batting on after passing the winning total to reach 95 without loss.
The Championship season started encouragingly, Leicestershire being beaten by an innings and 15 runs, largely down to the bowling of Gilhouley and John Cotton, who each took five wickets in an innings.
Notts didn’t win again for twelve matches, starting with a draw away to Hampshire. The Australian tourists came to Trent Bridge and showed their strength in depth. Neil Hawke took 6-19 as Notts were bowled out for 98, then Ian Redpath and Bob Cowper each scored tines as Australia posted 367-8dec. Notts recovered to 275-6, Ian Moore 108no, to bat out for a draw.
Roger Harman’s 8-12 – his career best – with his left arm spin was the stand out performance as Surrey took a six-wicket win at Trent Bridge. Also at home, Notts went down by 10 wickets to Middlesex, Peter Parfitt demonstrating his taste for the Notts bowling with 200no, his only double hundred.
A draw away to Essex at Brentwood was followed by a dismal showing against Warwickshire at the Griff and Coton Ground, Nuneaton. Nottinghamshire made just 34 and 57 and the home side romped to victory by an innings and 125 runs; Jack Bannister, eight wickets, and Tom Cartwright, nine wickets, did most of the damage.
The draw away to Middlesex at Lord’s was one of the few County games to be truncated by the weather. In a low-scoring encounter, Sussex won by 114 runs at Worthing. Evenly matched on first innings – Sussex 134, Notts 133 – the home side forged ahead, thanks to 103 by Jim Parks. When Notts batted again, John Snow took 5-32 to secure the win.
Notts were on their travels in June because Trent Bridge was hosting the First Test of an Ashes summer. Geoff Boycott made his England debut with the unlikely opening partner of spinner Fred Titmus. They could only reach 51-1 in the short playing time possible on the first day and by close-of-play on day two, England declared their first innings at 216-8. There was no play at all on day three and the game dwindled down to a draw.
Against Somerset at Taunton, Notts lost again, by six wickets. A ‘five-fer’ from Bill Alley and a century by Roy Virgin were the major contributions to the win.
This was followed by a sequence of five home matches – four at Trent Bridge and one at Worksop.
Mike Taylor made his debut for Notts against Warwickshire and top scored in the first innings – albeit with just 15 from a total of 49 all out. Notts managed to eke out the rest of the game to finish with a draw, Ian Davison taking 13 wickets in the match.
Kent won by three wickets with Davison, 5-63, again the main performer for Notts. The home side had the better of a draw against Somerset; Notts 242 and 211-5dec, the visitors 152 and 196-6.
Nottinghamshire then registered their second win of the season, beating Gloucestershire by nine wickets. Fores with eight wickets and Davison with seven, dismissed the visitors for 146 and 195; Notts made 241 and 101-1.
At Worksop, Notts ran out of time, pushing for a win against Hampshire and had to settle for the draw.
That the match versus Northamptonshire finished in two days rather than three was not due to the weather – rather it was the summary dismissal of the Notts batting. With Jim Watts taking 6-60, they were all out for 121 and 106 to leave the home side victors by an innings and 6 runs.
Still on the road, Notts went to Scarborough where Yorkshire won by eight wickets, Ray Illingworth’s 7-89 being the decisive factor. At Ilkeston, Carlton Forbes took 7-80 in Derbyshire’s first innings but 137 from Laurie Johnson and 6-25 from Edwin Smith gave the hosts a win by 162 runs.
Notts drew the return match with Northamptonshire in a match that saw the First-Class debut of Mike Smedley who, the Committee said, ‘showed promise and could develop into a useful batsman’; indeed, he was to play for Notts for 15 years and make more than 17,000 runs across all formats.
A century from Doug Padgett and a ‘five-fer’ for Tony Nicjolson helped Yorkshire to an innings and 34 run victory. Billy Rhodes, selected as a batter for this game, made his last appearance for Notts.
A typically sound 207 from Ken Barrington put Surrey in a strong position at The Oval, but Notts, marshalled by Brian Bolus, who made 106, resisted and played out the draw. Bolus’s century took him past 1,000 runs for the season and 9,000 career runs. Indicative of Nottinghamshire’s poor season with the bat, this – on 4 August – was the county’s first Championship century of the season.
No play was possible on the second day of the match with Lancashire at Old Trafford, which duly ended in a draw. Gamini Goonasena, back with Nottinghamshire after a lengthy time away, took 5-70 and 3-35 in the draw with Derbyshire at Trent Bridge.
A close finish saw Worcestershire scrape home by one wicket, ending on 168-9 at Trent Bridge. At St Helen’s, Swansea, Notts drew with Glamorganshire, a match that saw the final innings of Gilbert Parkhouse’s First-Class career; he made 45, during which he passed 23,500 career runs.
Notts beat Lancashire by eight wickets at Trent Bridge, with 101 from Brian Bolus the game’s top score. Bolus therefore scored the only two Championship hundreds for Notts – the other century being Ian Moore’s against the Australians.
Glamorgan were the next visitors to Nottingham and won comfortably by seven wickets.
The fourth and final win of the season came at Bristol as Nottinghamshire did the double over Gloucestershire, winning by the narrow margin of four runs, the second-closest win in Notts history. Tony Windows took 6-28 as Notts collapsed to 92 all out in their second innings, leaving Gloucester to chase 115. Four wickets for Andy Corran and 5-31 from Carlton Forbes saw Notts squeak home.
Tom Graveney made 164 before the Worcestershire spinners shot Notts out for 95, leaving the home side victors by 10 wickets.
The first Nottinghamshire Cricket Festival, held in July, was, said the Committee ‘a highly successful experiment’, due to be repeated in 1965 during the Sussex and Warwickshire matches, though given that Notts only won one home match in July, that success was obviously not judged on match results.
March 2026
Scorecards and stats can be seen here