Henry Horton (sportsman)

Henry Horton (18 April 1923 – 2 November 1998) was an English sportsman who played cricket for Hampshire in the 1950s and 1960s, having previously played a handful of times for Worcestershire in the 1940s. He also played football for Blackburn, Southampton, Bradford Park Avenue and Hereford.

Henry Horton

Horton in 1958
Personal information
Full name	Henry Horton
Born	(1923-04-18)18 April 1923 Colwall, Herefordshire, England
Died	2 November 1998(1998-11-02) (aged 75) Birmingham, Warwickshire, England
Batting	Right-handed
Bowling	Slow left-arm orthodox
Domestic team information
Years	Team
1946–1949	Worcestershire
1953–1967	Hampshire
Umpiring information
FC umpired	72 (1973–1976)
LA umpired	72 (1973–1976)
Career statistics
Competition First-class List A Matches 417 13 Runs scored 21,669 284 Batting average 32.83 21.84 100s/50s 32/122 0/2 Top score 160* 56 Balls bowled 348 0 Wickets 3 – Bowling average 64.66 – 5 wickets in innings 0 – 10 wickets in match 0 – Best bowling 2/0 – Catches/stumpings 264/– 3/–
Source: Henry Horton at ESPNcricinfo 8 November 2022 Association football career Position(s) Wing-half Senior career* Years Team Apps (Gls) ? Worcester City ? (?) 1946–1951 Blackburn Rovers 92 (5) 1951–1954 Southampton 75 (11) 1954–1955 Bradford Park Avenue 27 (0) 1955–1956 Hereford ? (?) *Club domestic league appearances and goals

Football career

Horton was born in April 1923 in Colwall, Herefordshire. As a sportsman, he initially excelled as a footballer who played at wing-half. After playing for Worcester City, Horton joined First Division Blackburn Rovers in 1946. Blackburn were relegated to the Second Division during the 1947–48 season, where they were to remain for rest of Horton's time with the club. Writing in The Independent, Derek Hodgson described him as an "obdurate, intransigent" defender. Horton left Blackburn at the end of the 1950–51 season, having made 92 appearances and scored five goals for the club.

He joined fellow Second Division side Southampton ahead of the 1951–52 season, for their then club record fee of £10,000. He played for Southampton mostly as a defender, but on occasion he played as a forward. His most notable goal came as a defender against Blackpool at Bloomfield Road in the Fifth Round of the 1952–53 FA Cup, when Southampton were trailing 1–0. Having won a free kick on the edge of the Blackpool box in the 86th minute, Horton went forward and headed in Peter Sillett's free kick. He played for Southampton until the 1953–54 season, having made 75 league appearances and scoring 11 goals.

At the end of that season, he attracted attention from Joe Mallett at Leyton Orient and Norman Kirkman at Bradford Park Avenue, both former Southampton players in managerial positions. He chose to joined Bradford Park Avenue, which Horton later lamented was a "silly" preference. He played just one season for Bradford Park Avenue, making 27 appearances. For the 1955–56 season, he played for Hereford in the Southern Football League.

Cricket career

Worcestershire

Horton began playing at first-class level as an amateur for Worcestershire, making his first-class debut against the Royal Air Force at Worcester in 1946. In the that season, he made his County Championship debut against Warwickshire.

Hampshire

Horton came late to full-time cricket, having spent most of his twenties concentrating on his football career. He joined Hampshire in 1953, but did not achieve a regular place in the side until 1955, the season when the West Indian Test batsman Roy Marshall qualified for the county. For the next dozen years, Horton batted mostly at No 3, usually following the opening partnership of Marshall and the all-rounder Jimmy Gray, and the three players were responsible for a high proportion of the runs scored by a side that was perennially weak in batting but strong in bowling.

Horton was essentially a defensive player, contrasting with the flamboyance of Marshall. He was a right-handed batsman with a curious and ungainly crouching stance, once described as if he was sitting on a shooting stick. But he made a lot of runs at a good average, and passed 1,000 runs in 12 consecutive seasons, going on to 2,000 in three of them. His total of 2,428 runs in 1959 is the sixth highest aggregate in Hampshire history, beaten only by Phil Mead (four times) and once by Marshall. He was a big contributor to Hampshire's two most successful County Championship seasons to that time: 1958, when the county came second to Surrey, and 1961, when it won the Championship for the first time.

Horton remained fit into his mid-forties, and completed 1,000 for the last time in 1966. The following year, with younger players coming into the side, he played a few games and then retired from playing. He became a first-class umpire for a few seasons, then retired back to Herefordshire to live with his sisters in their home town of Colwall.

Family

He was the younger brother of Joseph Horton, who played more than 60 times for Worcestershire in the 1930s and who died just four days after him.

External links

• Henry Horton at ESPNcricinfo
• "Henry Horton". Barry Hugman's Footballers.