Cricket 1883

“ Together joined in cricket’s manly toil.”— B y r o n . THURSDAY , DECEMBER 27, 1883. p r i c e ad. G E O R G E A L E X A N D E R . In accordance with the wish o£ a large number of readers of C ricket we give herewith a portrait of Mr. George Alexander, of the Mel­ bourne Club, a player already favour­ ably known to cricketers in various parts of the United Kingdom. As one of the Second Australian Team which visited England in 1880, Mr. Alexander will be well remembered on English cricket grounds. As an all-round cricketer, though by virtue of his position as general adviser, his services were mainly directed to the supervision of the financial and external arrangements of the tour, he several times proved of great assistance, and in the memorable match between England and Austra­ lia, his plucky stand at the close of the Colonials’ second innings helped materially to turn what seemed likely to be a very disastrous into a reallycreditable defeat.:It was chiefly, though, as manager of that second trip of Australian cricketers, that he was best known in England, and under circumstances, as many will remember, requiring a good deal of tact and careful administration, he won golden opinions from all classes of Englishmen. It will, therefore, be heard with considerable satisfac­ tion by cricketers over here that he has been the moving spirit in the negotiations commenced on the other side for the visit of another Colonial team to these shores during the summer of 1884. As the representa­ tive of the Fourth party of cricketers Australia has sent out to oppose the strength of England on its own ground, Mr. Alexander’s portrait will be just now of particular inter­ est. As a player he has borne a by no means unimportant part on the cricket fields of Australia. As far as we can find, his first appearance for Victoria, in an Inter-Colonial match, was at Melbourne, in December, 1875, when New South Wales won by an innings and one run. Allan, Horan, Slight, B. B. Cooper, Allee, Blackham, and Boyle, all of them well-known to English oricketers, also on this occasion represented Victoria, to whom were opposed on the side of New South Wales D. Gregory (the captain of the first Australian team), C. Bannerman, Spofforth, Murdoch, and Coates, the last of whom, as many will remem­ ber, played for the South against the North at Lords on Whit Monday, 1877. The scoring generally on the Victorian side in that con­ test was very low, and Alexander, who was credited with eight not out and eleven, had the distinction of being the - highest contributor in Victoria’s second innings of 34. He was also credited with two wickets for 12 runs, and in the Inter-colonial at Sydney two months later was again singularly the principal run-getter on the side of Victoria, though the eleven were only able to score 37 and 95. His name does not appear in the Inter-Colonial matches of 1877 or 1878, but he was apparently then in capital form both with bat and ball, and in the Victorian batting as well as bowling averages occupied a conspicuous position with an aggre­ gate in the former of 495 for 30 com­ pleted innings (average 16i) and in the latter a fine average of 4.118 for 135 wickets, the largest number credited to any Victorian bowler during the season. In the first Inter­ colonial at Sydney, in November, 1879, he was only able to secure eight runs in his two innings, but at Melbourne in December of the same year he was again champion scorer for Victoria, and his finely - hit 75 helped in a great measure to­ wards its easy victory by an innings and 96 runs, Mention has already been made of his connection with the second Australian team, and both in their preliminary matches at home as well as in England when his services were required he was very useful in every department. In the memorable contest at the Oval, to which we have referred, when Alexander, who was tenth on the list, joined Murdoch, 84 runs were still required to save an innings de­ feat, and the former’s plucky and well hit 33 contributed in a great measure to the excellent show made in the end by the Australians. In all during the tour in the Colonies and in England he scored 684 runs in 58 comDlete1} nnings, and took Next Number of CRICKET will be published Thursday. January 3l.