Peter Arnold sadly passed away on September 6th, 2021 at the age of 94.

For a few months, Peter was St Bede’s oldest living Old Boy, and he was also Northamptonshire County Cricket Club’s oldest surviving first-class cricketer, at the time of his passing.

From the time he started at St Bede’s, Peter Arnold was always in a cricket team. In 1940, he started in the Under 14 team and the comments from the 1940 Bedean were “Arnold (251), very consistent” for his batting and in the fielding he “did excellent work”. In 1941, he was in the Under 15 A Team and was “to be congratulated on heading the batting average with 156 runs in 6 innings”.

By 1942, Peter was now in the First XI with the comment “our batting honours went to P Arnold, who showed splendid temperament for a young player, and was not disturbed when he gave chances”. They went on to say he was a splendid opening batsman and had a fine record for such a young player.

1943 saw him play his second season for the First XI, and the comment was now “P Arnold is an ideal opening batsman and played several fine innings. His judgement was rarely at fault, whether in playing strokes or in running between wickets.” Peter developed strong friendships with his St Bedes’ First XI team-mates, and Denis O’Malley was a lifelong friend.

Upon leaving St Bede’s, Peter joined the West Christchurch University cricket club, and he continued scoring heavily. He was to maintain links with the club for many years after leaving Christchurch, and forged a close friendship with future NZ cricket captain, Graham Dowling.

In 1950, Peter made the long journey to England, hoping to carve out a career in cricket there. Frank (Francis) O’Brien (1924 – 1926), a Northamptonshire county player before WW2 recommended Peter to the ‘Northants’ committee. Peter’s pre-season trials were successful and he made his debut against Scotland, and his Championship debut against Lancashire, where he batted at number seven and made a favourable 68 runs. Peter and his wife Rosemary came back to New Zealand and he played the domestic season for Canterbury 1953 - 1954, however, although he topped the averages in New Zealand’s first-class competition, the Plunket Shield, he wasn’t selected for the Black Caps and so when Northants made him an attractive offer, he and Rosemary decided to move back to England. From 1954 - 1960, Peter played in the position of opening batsman for Northants. In his best season, Peter scored almost 1600 runs, including 3 centuries and a career best of 122 against Somerset at Taunton.

In 1960, after making over 7000 runs for the club in 167 first-class appearances, and with a lucrative business opportunity on-hand, Peter made the decision to retire from cricket. Peter carved out a very successful career in business, founding and leading ‘Arnold Hose’, which was a leading supplier to the English automotive industry. Forever loyal to the game, he gave much back to cricket, serving as a member of the English Cricket Board (ECB) whilst always remaining a loyal member of Northampton CCC where he served as Club Captain, Chairman, and finally President from 1996 until 2000. He continued to attend the reunions for first class players for as long as his health allowed.

Peter’s loyalties also continued to extend to New Zealand. He was affectionately referred to as ‘Kiwi’ by his English friends. In Peter’s capacity as Northants’ Chairman, he and Graham Dowling began conversations about an exchange scholarship programme between Northants and Canterbury cricket, when Dowling was Executive Director of NZC. The first scholar to arrive from Northants was current NZ Cricket women’s coach, Bob Carter, and the first scholar sent back to England from Canterbury in 1983 was Justin Boyle’s brother, David. Peter fostered this programme, and the development of a number of young cricketers for several decades. It is therefore entirely appropriate that the new cricket nets at St Bede’s were named after Peter Arnold.

Northamptonshire Chairman Gavin Warren said “Northamptonshire County Cricket Club is so grateful to Peter for the enormous contribution he made both on and off the cricket pitch”. There are a large number of Peter’s friends in the Bedean, Christchurch, and NZ Cricket communities who feel the same; and who will miss a fine man of faith, and good works.

This article has extracts from Bedean Magazines 1940-1943, Faith of our Fathers and Northampton County Cricket Club.