In his one match, his bowling was very impressive and was one of the main reasons for Ireland gaining a 38 run victory over I Zingari. After being 0* in the first innings, he took 3-31 when IZ batted. These included the hit wicket dismissal of WC Bridgeman, who was to feature in Conservative Cabinets in Britain in the 1920s, as Home Secretary and then First Lord of the Admiralty. He was also to become President of the MCC. Possibly his political advancement in the 1920s was helped by the Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, also being a cricket enthusiast! Thomas also removed The Hon Michael Coventry, whose brother Hon CJ Coventry, a participant in the notorious Jameson Raid, was reported killed in the First Boer War but returned home to attend his own wake. Making 4 at number 11 in the Irish second innings Thomas again came to the rescue with the ball. When IZ wanted only 156, he took 4-27, removing Coventry caught at slip and Bridgeman, taken at point, with successive balls. Though he then dropped a catch during an awkward last wicket stand, good fielding by Drummond Hamilton brought about a run out, and victory was assured. However Thomas never played for Ireland again. His figures for Leinster CC were useful, if not spectacular. Thus in 1892, he came fifth in the bowling with 16 wickets at 19.25. By comparison, the averages were headed by a precocious teenager called RH Lambert, who had 71 at 6.60.

Though Dublin born, Thomas was from an old Co Cork family and thus in the Munster side when the first ever interprovincial tournament was played in May 1890. It was staged at Rathmines preparatory to the establishment of the - then short lived - Irish Cricket Union. Unfortunately the weather was poor and the Leinster side was, for the opening match against Munster, below strength as some of its members were still en route from Ireland's first ever match with Scotland. All games were two innings affairs, the first one ending in a draw. In their first innings Leinster collapsed from 103-2 t0 187 all out with Thomas taking 5-67. He might have had even better figures, a number of catches being missed. The match finished, however, to the hosts' advantage with Munster, needing163 on 93-8.

The Munster v Ulster match followed and was again a low scoring one, marked by some very slow batting. Munster managed only 64 and 25, but in between bowled their opponents out for 54 in 21 overs, Thomas taking 4-23. In their second innings the northerners took 29 overs and lost 8 wickets in making the 36 neeeded to win, Thomas this time was not so formidable.

It seems strange that Thomas Collis Perrott played only once for Ireland, considering his performance in his one match. It is probable that the pressure of work was the reason. Certainly in the 1892 season, he bowled only 124 overs taking 16 wickets, whereas Bob Lambert (229 overs) and GT Keatinge (432 overs) each took 71. Away from cricket, Thomas, a solicitor by profession was shown by the 1901 census as unmarried and living with his Trinidad born widowed mother and three younger spinster sisters. He married in 1903 and he and his wife were - with a male servant - the only occupants of the family home by 1911.

TC Perrott was originally identified as General Sir Thomas Perrott. Regretably this was incorrect.

Edward Liddle, October 2007; Updated October 2010