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The Row of the Rowleys: When cricket led to a divorce

A woman named Mildred Rowley was granted divorce because her husband was cricket-mad.

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Mr and Mrs Edmonds have a ball in the pool. Unfortunately for Mr and Mrs Rowley, it was not a cricketing honeymoon all the way © Getty Images
Mr and Mrs Edmonds have a ball in the pool. Unfortunately for Mr and Mrs Rowley, it was not a cricketing honeymoon all the way © Getty Images

August 25, 1981. A woman named Mildred Rowley was granted divorce because her husband was cricket-mad. Arunabha Sengupta revisits the rather unsuccessful dance down the wicket.

We have been caught looking at the cricket score when our spouses have demanded full and complete attention. We have sometimes kept an eye on the cricket commentary in the background even as our better halves have variously uttered terms of endearment, or voiced what they actually thought about us.

Things have been awkward on occasions. There have been the quasi-simulation of a woman (even a man) spurned, angry words, or even a full-blown lover’s tiff.

However, I doubt if it has ever ended relationships. That cannot happen because one of the partners is obsessed with the game. The only possibility of cricket ending relationships, we feel, is when the partners disagree about who the best batsman in the team is. Of whether A or B was a more inspirational captain. Then things can go downhill quite fast.

Yet, separation due to cricket has indeed occurred. And I hope it remains a lesson to all of us.

Let us go back to 1981, and make our way to Wolverhampton.

A news bulletin that appeared in August, 1981, read: “A woman was granted a divorce Tuesday on the grounds her husband’s obsession with cricket constituted unreasonable behaviour.”

The incident involved Mildred Rowley as the aggrieved wife and Michael Rowley, the husband who was accused of having another love in his life.

According to Mildred, Michael was ‘cricket mad’. A 51-year-old nurse, Mildred had been married to Michael Rowley for 17 years. However, by 1981, when the entire country was caught in a frenzy because of the miraculous deeds of Ian Botham through the summer, the situation reached breaking point.

Interviewed after the hearing, Mildred said: “Cricket was not just a hobby: it was a total obsession. I had just had enough of it.”

Her husband, Michael, had of course deigned to turn up in court. He was in the resort city of Torquay keeping score for his favourite cricket team, the Worcestershire Marauders.

When contacted, he was quite forgiving of Mildred as he jotted down the singles and the dot balls on his sheet. “I don’t blame Mildred for what she has done,” he said. “I told her from the beginning cricket would always come first, but she did not believe me.”

To underline the point, he added: “I just can’t exist without cricket.”

Asked why he was not at the hearing, Mr Rowland had his excused ready. “I cannot stop. We have to get on with the game.” So saying, he went back to his scorebook and felt tipped pen and his eyes pursued the happenings in the middle as Worcestershire Marauders got on with the game.

This story was included in the book Cricket Extras by David Rayvern Allen, the BBC Music Producer and prolific author of books on cricket. In that volume, the episode of the Rowleys was masterfully captured in a cartoon by David Arthur.

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