|| Rubaid Iftekhar ||

Cricket has long been dubbed as the ‘game of royals’. Its regality and gentlemanly nature attracted a lot of Princes, Nawabs and Knights to play the game. Nawab of Pataudi, Sir Ranjit Singhji, Sir Duleep Singhji and Sultan Zarwani are few of the royals who have caressed a cricket field. Interestingly, only one member of the British royal family took up cricket, a game their countrymen invented, as a serious sport. That rare honor goes to Prince Victor.

Prince Christian Victor of Schleswig-Holstein was Queen Victoria’s grandson. His mother Princess Helena was her third daughter. Victor was born on 14th April 1967. Around that time club cricket was very popular amongst England’s working class and elites alike. The Queen herself took a lot of interest in the game. She was one of the key persons to establish the Home Park Cricket Club in 1850, on a field at the foot of the Windsor Castle. Since then, royal family members were regular patrons for the club. The Prince Consort was also a patron for the famous Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC). 

Also, the Queen and with Albert, the Prince Consort encouraged their children to play cricket. They hired a professional coach, Frederick William Bell of Cambridge to teach their young sons. Their sons took the sport very seriously. The Prince of Wales became a patron for the MCC and the Surrey County Cricket Club. The eagerness of the Royal Family to the game was discernable.

Prince Victor got very attached to the game after watching his uncle’s playing closely. "Christle", as the prince was known in the family, was a keen learner and attended school. He was the first British Royal to attend school rather than having homeschooling. He made her grandmother proud by attending Wellington College as Prince Albert helped establish it. At Wellington Prince Victor played for the college team in 1883 and became a captain in 1885. He was also captain of the cricket team while at Magdalen College and Sandhurst. 

He joined the army after his studies but that did not keep him away from cricket. Victor continued to play for his Army regiment and excelled. He even scored a double hundred in 1893 against the Devonshire Regiment at Rawalpindi, while playing for the King’s Royal Rifles. 

But the match that set Prince Christian Victor of Schleswig-Holstein apart came six years before this incident in 1887. He represented the I Zingari club against a match with Gentlemen of England. This was officially recognized as a first-class cricket match and set a very rare record of a British Royal blood participating in a match of such magnitude. I Zingari was an amateur club formed in England in 1845. As they did not have any home ground, they were nomadic in nature. But their matches were recorded by Wisden since 1967 and till 2005.

Prince Victor scored 35 and 0 in the two first-class innings he ever played. Other than the aforementioned match in Rawalpindi, he participated in village cricket matches and also founded his eponymous cricket team.