Bill Lawry
Lawry was born in the Melbourne suburb of Thornbury. He was given the names William Morris after the early Prime Minister of Australia, William Morris Hughes. His father Alfred played amateur cricket until the age of 51. Bill never saw his father play, who was aged 47 when Bill was born. Aged nine, he played competitive cricket for the first time with the Thornbury Presbyterian Church team. He spent three years there, as well as playing for Preston Technical School. When he was twelve, he entered Melbourne's district competition playing for Northcote's fourth team, working his way up to the First XI by the age of sixteen. At the time, he was apprenticed as a plumber and attending Preston Technical College. Lawry was selected for Victoria's Second XI at the age of seventeen. He made a duck against the South Australians and did not see any further action for the Seconds for the rest of the summer of 1954–55. The following season, Lawry was recalled to the Seconds and scored 183 against South Australia.
William Norris (cricketer)
Norris was educated at Eton College and at Trinity College, Cambridge. Norris was a regular cricket player as a middle-order batsman in the first team at Eton, appearing in the Eton v Harrow match in both 1848 and 1849. At Cambridge, he had only one match for the first eleven, but that was the University Match of 1851 against Oxford University, when he batted at No 10 and scored 12 runs in his only innings. After this match, he played only in minor cricket.