Cricket 1884

THURSDAY, MAY 15, 1884. p r ic e ad. himself with credit, contributing thirteen and forty-eight. An absentee from this the best match of the year, both at Lord’s and Prince’s, in 1877, he was a second time chosen to help the Players at the Oval, and again 'justified the confidence of the Surrey authorities, playing a very fine first innings of seventy. In 1878 his bat­ ting was attended throughout with great success. He opened the season most auspiciously with a very fine score of sixty-six against the Austra­ lians on the Trent Bridge Ground on the occasion of their first match in England, and his contribution amounted to three more than were made by the Colonial eleven in their opening innings. Against Yorkshire at Sheffield he was at the wickets three hours and three quarters for a score of a hundred and seven, and among his other notable scores for the County were sixty-two against Middlesex at Lord’s, ninety-six in the return at Nottingham, and fifty-six against Surrey at the Oval. For the North against the South at the Surrey Ground he played a fine innings of seventy-six, but his crown­ ing performance was for the Players against the Gentlemen at Lord’s, and his first appearance in this match on the Marylebone ground produced certainly the best batting feat of the year. In thd first innings Emmett and he made a hundred aud ten runs while they were together, and his two scores of eighty- eight and sixty-four against the cream of amateur bowling presented a display of cricket never—well, hardly ever—sur­ passed even in the history of the most important contest of the season. Selby, who had formed one of the team which visited Australia at the end of 1876, under the auspices of James Lillywhite, was also selected by Eichard Daft to form one of the party which starred in America and Canada in the fall of 1879; another season in which he was well to the front in the Not­ tinghamshire averages, standing third in the list- His best score in 1880 was his 123 against M.C.C. and Ground at Nottingham, and this was his second innings of three figures on the Trent Bridge Ground for Nottinghamshire. Joining in the strike against the executive of the Notts Club he played little for the County cket’s manly toil.”— Byron. JOHN S E L B Y . A mong the professional cricketers to whose ability Nottinghamshire mainly owes the proud position it has occupied in the fore­ front of county cricket of late years, John Selby deserves a conspicuous place. Son of William Selby, in hi* day a well-known Nottingham player, the love of the game was directly inherited. Born at Nottingham on July 1, 1819, he soon began to Bhow proficiency on the cricket field, and before he was nineteen he was fulfilling his first engagement. His earliest con­ nection as a professional player was with the Dewsbury Club in 1868, and this was followed by promotion to Oxford Univer­ sity, to which he was attached as a bowler in the summer of 1869. The succeeding Eastertide of 1870 found him participating in the annual colts match of the Notts County Club, and with evident credit. The excellent style in which he shaped for his first innings of twenty-two on that occasion in conjunction with the brilliant fielding he displayed, Btamped him as a youngster of no mean promise. Indeed he was deemed worthy of an early trial in the County Eleven, and he was not yet twenty-one years of age when he made his first appearance for Notts on June 23,1870, against Yorkshire at Not­ tingham. Two very useful scores of seventeen and fifteen were the result of his opening show in the Nottinghamshire team, and as he played five more innings during the season it is evident that his ability even then was fully appreciated. Eleven innings for an aggregate of a hundred and twenty-five runs represented the sum of his batting for Notts in the following year, and again his best per­ formance was against Yorkshire at Nottingham, where he obtained twenty-one and eleven in capital form. Els average in 1871 was eleven runs and » Ijalfper innings,but in 1872 he showed an extraordinary improvement, and his play during that year placed him very high among the professionals of the time. His best dis­ play was his 128 not out against Gloucestershire at Nottingham, but it was by no means his only innings of high value, and his average at the end of the season for Notts was over forty- two runs. A slight deterioration in his batting in 1873 caused him to be left out of the County Eleven the following season, and he did not play at all for Notts during 1874. This omis­ sion, no doubt, stimulated him to greater exertion, and his reappearance in 1875 was attended with such success that the end of the season found him second in the list of batting averages. Again- Gloucestershire bowl­ ing contributed to his best display, but his sixty-six and thirty-seven against Mr. W. G. Grace’s Eleven were followed by other good innings, among them fifty-two and forty-six against Surrey, thirty-nine against Derbyshire, and thirty-four against Middlesex. Though he did not figure in the same match at Lord’s until two year3 later, he made his first appear­ ance for the Players against the Gentlemen at the Oval in 1876, and here too lie acquitted