Lords Jewish cricket exhibition highlights community’s global love for the game
'Jews came to integrate, to love this country, and some obviously adopted cricket, one of the great national games', said Zaki Cooper, one of the curators of the new exhibition at Lords
Lee Harpin is the Jewish News's political editor
A hugely anticipated Ashes test series, which starts this week, might not feature a single Jewish cricketer on the field of play.
But within a newly-opened exhibition at the magnificent Lords ground in St John’s Wood, north London, the vast impact the sport has had on the community over the century is made quite apparent.
Two of the community’s most respected cricket fans Zaki Cooper and Daniel Lightman, both Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) members themselves, and authors of a book on the sport, first brought the idea for a Cricket and the Jewish Community exhibition to the authorities at Lords back in 2019.
After being given the green-light to proceed, with the help of a team of curators, including Neil Robinson, the MCC’s head of heritage and collections, the resulting exhibition, which opens this month in a community room at the Lord’s Museum inside the ground’s famous Grace Gates, is a remarkably vibrant, eclectic and enjoyable showcase of global Jewish influence on cricket.
“There’s definitely an overlap between Judaism and cricket,” Cooper told Jewish News, as we visited the exhibition ahead of its opening this month.
“I think partly it’s the heritage and the tradition.
“But as well, it’s all of the data, all of the numbers – you can become a, sort of, real Talmudic expert in cricket. It’s amazing how many people in the Orthodox community really enjoy their cricket.”
Amongst the many highlights of the exhibition , the tzitzit of South African cricketer Mandy Yachad, which he wore while batting in a test match, are displayed in a frame on one wall, while the amazing achievements of Dr Ali Bacher, the famous South African cricket captain, are celebrated on another.
With England about to take on the Aussies, you learn also about the remarkable success of Julien Wiener, the Jewish cricketer who opened for Australia in the 1979 test series.
Elsewhere in the room a tribute is played to the great Yorkshire and England fast bowler Fred Trueman, whose claim towards the end of his life that he was Jewish is open to some debate.
Also noted is the contribution of Aileen Cohen, who was at her home in St John’s Wood, when Test Match Special commentator Brian Johnston bemoaned the lack of cake for his radio colleagues when the the players were being served tea and cake at Lord’s.
Cohen decided to bake a cake herself, and made the short journey Lords to deliver her gift to Johnson and the commentary team, which subsequently earned the Jewish cook legendary status.
There is also sizable tribute to grassroots communal cricket teams such as Belmont, and London Maccabi Vale Cricket Club.
Observing the highlights of the exhibition, Lightman, a KC, who co-wrote the acclaimed book Cricket Grounds from the Air with Cooper, speaks fondly of the statue of Lord Dalmeny, the Jewish captain of Surrey county cricket club from 1905 to 1907, who became an MP.
“For the last year he was combining captaincy of Surrey being a member of parliament, and he would rush from The Oval at the end of the day in order to vote.”
And also of female star Netta Rheinberg, the only Jew to have played cricket for England in 1949, against Australia in a test match, unfortunately without scoring any runs in either innings.
But notable in the women’s game as an administrator and journalist, the exhibition notes Rheinberg was later again “involved in cricketing history” as she was the first woman to become an honorary member of the notoriously traditional MCC in 1999.
Robinson says the exhibition, which will remain at Lords for the next two years, will hopefully inspire other communities and ethnic minorities to come forward with the stories around their love for the game of cricket.
He says the approach from Cooper and Lightman to stage their Jewish story of cricket came at a time when the MCC were “reflecting on how we could communicate the history of cricket, not simply telling stories from an MCC or anglocentric point of view, but trying to reflect we are a global game with a global audience.
“Everybody has a different point of view and a different story to tell.”
Both Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis and MCC president Stephen Fry have delivered personal video messages featuring within the exhibition, which also features a section looking at the inevitable impact of antisemitism on the sports appeal to the community.
“We talk a lot about Lords being the ‘home of cricket,” reflects Robinson. “If that is true we really have to be a home for everybody who loves the game, whatever part of the world they come from, whatever community.
“We don’t simply want to be a museum for Lords, for English cricket or for the MCC. We want people to come here and feel that their cricketing culture and contribution to the heritage of the game is celebrated as much as anyone else’s.”
Despite the impact of discrimination, the exhibition ultimately reflects a positive and upbeat message about the love affair for cricket among many in the community.
It might even appeal to those without the slightest interest in the sport as well.
“I think this is a story about Jewish history and Jewish integration over time and how Jews settled in this country,” reflects Cooper.
“We came to integrate and to love the country, and some people obviously adopted cricket, one of the great national games.
“I think there is a wider story, not just about cricket, it’s about Jewish integration over time.
“The Jewish community becoming fully part of British society. Proud Jews and proud Britains as well.”
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