Cricket 1885

402 CKICKET; A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. SEPT. 17, 1885, nearly 21 runs for thirty completed innings, lie was seen to even better advantage this f-ummer, and throughout the season his hatting has been of a consistently high order. His innings of 114 against Notts last July, though not the highest he has made, is, perhaps, the best ever credited to him, and the one reverse the Notts eleven suffered in 1885 was in a great measure due to the brilliant batting of Grimshaw and Leo. At the present time Grimshaw may fairly be classed as one of the best profes­ sional batsmen in England. Keeping his bat very straight ha has strong defence, and plays very hard in an effective, if not a pretty, style: his driving and cutting in partioular being very acourate and clean. He is a good field anywhere, but especially in the oountry, being a sure catch, and smart in his return. ‘ •’ T IS S IX T Y Y E A R S S IN C E .” S oM K M U SIN G S BY A M E M B E R OF TH E M .C .C . w h o j o in e d t h e C l u b in 1825. B y L o r d C h a b l e s J. F. B u s s e l l . Continued from page 386. That the professionals should think more of gain than game seems natural, nay laudable. They cannot work at cricket for long, twenty years of it is an .unusually protracted career, and a small competence and comfort should be its sequel. That the profession destroys the patriotism of tho player is often stateei, but experience contradicts it. County . matches draw together vast numbers, aud their champions must be influenced by the interest mani­ fested. Let the Marylebone Club play Not­ tinghamshire or Lancashire at Lord’s and but few attend, because the counties are so distant, and but few beyond its members have any feeling for the club, while all the matches played for Surrey at the Oval never fail to draw because they are played in the county. That playing almost every day should make the men inert is almost inevitable, tut not entirely without remedy. The professional element should, where possible, be subordinated by playing a gentleman or two if efficient-in every eleven. They act like two or three oouples of Iadie3 in a dog pack, give them a fillip, put life into them, and send them along. Who can tell the inestimable benefit of Mr. Hornby to the Lancashire eleven ? As it is urged the system of averages lessens the professional’s interest in the other parts of the game, the evil might he lessened by an extension of the system. It is not very long ago when the bowlers’ column did not exist; he only got credit for the wickets he bowled, none for the players caught from his balls. He now gets his due, a record of his skill in all its bearings. Let the same justice be done to the batter. The reporter often notices the state of the game at the fall of each wicket. Now, as it takfs two players to make one run, let a new column give, besides the runs made, the runs run by each player. That would show the value of the defensive batter, who so materially assists his side by battling and tiring the bowlers, so enabling the punishers to bring their powers to bear. l'hat fine player and captain of an eleven, the Australian, Murdoch, used always to start his side with on® safe fltid pne dangerous— Bannerman and Mr. Massie, or McDonnell if the latter came o ff; on his coming out, his captain went in and followed su it; if he failed his captain joined Bannerman in defence, and played his game for his fol­ lowers. In 1861 Mr. Burrup, hon. secretary of the Surrey Club, on an invitation from Australia, sent out a team of twelve pro­ fessional cricketers under the captaincy of H. H. Stephenson. A better selection of captain could not have been made, as was testified from Australia. In 1863 the pro­ fessional element caught up the idea, and another eleven accompanied George Parr to the Antipodes ; amongst them was Caffjn, who remained there for nine years, and assisted in framing Australian cricket to be what it now is. Subsequently the lamented Mr. Fitzgerald conducted a party of gentlemen cricketers to play matches in Canada and the United States, and only a year or two ago Daft was complimented by being invited to lead an eleven to the United States, where his recep­ tion was enthusiastic, although we have the authority of Mr. Herbert Spencer, that the Americans are too much addicted to business, and consequently physically deteriorated. One other great value of the professional element is to be found by employing it, similarly to what the Earl of Sheffield seems to be attempting for Sussex, through Alfred Shaw. There can be no more profitable investment for a County club than one pro­ fessional player with ;one amateur to take charge of him aud send him by weeks or months to different towns and villages as bowler and coach, aud use him in games and matches, so handicapping the county elevens. A professional bowling at one end and a colt at the otlur induces patience, and defensive play till the good time of the weak bowler comes; it was the neglect of culture of native talent that led to the decay of the grand o il Kent eleven, Felix, Mynn, Pilch, Wenman, Hillier, and Martingell, three natives, two imported, and one an immigrant. The glories of Kent were for one year equalled by Surrey, who in 1858 won all their matches which are recorded in their pavilion at the Oval on a shield of marbls in letters of gold, amongst them being England defeated in a single innings by 28 runs. Mr. Miller was the captain, the eleven were called the “ Miller and his Men.” Mr. Burbidge, Caffyn, Cauar. alphabetically came first. Surrey, like Kent, has had its reverses, but both counties have risen again by the practice of the almost forgotten good old Anglo Saxon word dint, which is the full development of try ; it *nav be called a noble word, and more particularly so in the county of Kent in the cause of cricket, where Lord Harris has noblj amplified it. Having been thus led to acknowledge the fact of giants of other days, and having abstained from dishonouring them by imperfect criticism and provoking comparisons, it yet may be allowable to stray into the privileged regions of taste, and to tell of the pictures that now, mellowed to us in a golden twilight, are most evident to the mind’s eye. First the graceful curve of Cobbett’s bowling, next the grandeur and pace of Bed- gate’s, then the classical subject for sculptors, the attack and defence of Eedgate and Weninan’s fast bowling and back play, lastly the supple subtle surprising C. G. Taj lor. Thus much for the graces of past cricket, they must lead onward and upwnrd to his Grace of Gloucestershire, a rojal title now in abeyance, but not desecrated by being applied to the king of cricketers. Although sijch disputed points as past and present and comparative excellence are to be avoided, yet one admitted fact may be dwelt on, the marvellous advance in wicket-keeping. This Lord F. Beauclerc admitted in his last days, when a constant visitor at Lord’s in his green brougham, though utterly unable to quit it. But what progress since that time ! Box, who astonished his lordship aud others, was good for nothing on the on- side, and never could have dreamed of dis­ pensing with a long-stop. Before his time, but in that of Lord Frederick, two were frequently employed. In selecting an eleven thirty years ago, four bowlers, a wicket-keeper and a long- stop were the foundation of the side, and often a man was played mainly on his merits as a long-stop, who now would hardly be worth his salt as a cricketer, his rervices being always dispensed with in slow bowling, generally in medium j)aced, and sometimes in fast, but with a dreadfully flattening effect when a fast ball passes the wicket­ keeper, with nothing behind him but the boundary ! In this part of cricket, however much improved it may be, justice bids us say that the Australians have kept pace with us in the person of Mr. Blackham. In a paper which is neither critical nor professional, but wishes to be popular, the other Austra­ lians must not be treated of as batters, bowlers or fielders, but as a body corporate, an eleven ; and then it must be said when they first appeared they played the game better tl.an those they were opposed to ; they played more as one man, harder, livelier, more up, owing probably to being under a good captain, constantly playing together and perhaps being more united by being strangers in the laml. That these influences were at work may be sustained by seeing the recent success of Shaw’s eleven in Australia, which certainly has been far greater than could have been expected ; and now one more note of admiration for the Australians as an eleven, they could not by possibility have done the work they did hut for their temperate habits, playing day by day for more than four months, constantly travelling very often by night and never sleepy in the field. The majority were said to be total abstainers, and few, if any, smokel. We must admiro and thank them, although our ciicketers did not require them to teaoh them the necessity of temporance for successful athleticism, the professional phase of cricket had already done that. A generation back some players were regarded with suspicion as not being “ two-day men,” now a player mu=t be an every-day man, Sundays escepted. Perhaps tlie keenness and joyful zeal with which one little market town met another in cricket a few years back has psssed from us, but with it has gone its bane, t’liese chi hi were mainly supported by tradesmen and artisans, and owing to rough ground and imperfect hatting the matches did not last long. A “ two-day man ” was not vsi ued, nor anyone allowed to be a good cricketer who could not stand up to two Lotties of port on the night of the match (To be Concluded in our next.) S p y b e v ’ k Annua i . R e g is t e r of Notting­ h a m s h ir e Crioket Matches for 188.), has just been issued. It contains fnll scores of, and notes on all Notta matches and averages, wi'h a lot of interesting information respecting Notts Cricket and Cricketers. The; Jtcyiatir can be hud of W r ig h t & Co., 41, S t Andrew's ll ill , E.C. Post-free for “d.