Hollies did not spin the ball as much as most leg-spinners but he gained in accuracy as a result, and he frequently bowled amazingly long spells for his county, most notably 73 overs in one innings against Worcestershire in 1949.

With Hollies taking a total of 499 wickets as their professional, West Bromwich Dartmouth won the league every year from 1941 to 1945 and lost only seven matches during the war period.

[3] At his peak, he was one of the best bowlers in England, and it is believed that the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) erred in not taking him to Australia, after he was the leading wicket-taker in the country for a struggling Warwickshire side in 1946.

That year, on one of the relatively few hard pitches, he took, without the direct assistance of a fielder, all ten wickets (seven bowled, three LBW) in an innings against Nottinghamshire.

[5] Bateman added: "when it was time to get his pads on, Eric would prop his bat up in the Edgbaston dressing room window and say to it: 'Now while I’m getting ready, you find out what the ball’s doing'”.

Hollies died in Chinley, Derbyshire in April 1981, at the age of 68. a Jem Shaw between 1865 and 1870 played his first seventy-one first-class innings before reaching double figures.