Cricket 1887

4 CRICKET: A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. JAN. 27, 1887. no quarrels, except sometimes with the decisions of umpires—and no class or sectarian jealousies, except when a silly curate boxes the ears of a scorer in whom he detects a truant treble from his choir, or a stupid cobbler walks off the ground because he has been given out by the village schoolmaster, with whom he had a squabble during luncheon about Mr. Bradlaugh. Wherever the Union flag is displayed in our colonies and depend­ encies there a cricket-ground is extemporised, even if it be the dusty surfade of the sun- parched barrack-yard, with an asphalted patch for a wicket, or perchance, after the bitter experience of grass-seeding, producing nothing but a few radishes and a dandelion or two, five-and-twenty yards of cocoanut-matting laid down for the nonce. One of the most gleeful scenes which can be imagined is ex­ hibited when an English man-of-war comes to an anchor in some f oreign port, and a couple of elevens are landed for a game on the beach: not only are their comrades interested, but the native population seldom fail to form an appreciative ring of spectators, who are now and then led by their curiosity and enthusiasm to take up positions of considerable danger, to the high diversion of all the lookers-on, who are in ecstacies when the syndic involuntarily fields a hit in the region of the waistcoat—or the mule of some market-woman, startled by a ball in its ribs, careers wildly between the wickets or among the crowd. The cricket monarch is, as far as the British empire is concerned, much in the position of the Greek conqueror to the habitable globe of his own day—supreme, with no new worlds to conquer. But whispers are afloat that there are in­ dications of the waning popularity of cricket. Why should this be—if, indeed, it is a fact ? Looking at the headquarters of the game, it would certainly seem that it grows in public favour every year. The Marylebone Club, with three thousand members, and an annual addition of about a hundred to its numbers, suffers from congestion, and has candidates sufficient for the next quarter of a century. Were it not for the latitude extended to the committee of selecting half the names to be elected from the ranks of the young cricketers of the day, “ grey-headed and bald-headed” would indeed be the description of the mem­ bers of Lord’s. And the balance-sheet for 1885 shows receipts amounting to upwards of £17,000, of which Jt'2,778 were the proceeds of the Universities’ and the Eton and Harrow matches. This year the elections for the new Parliament took place in the same week as these matches; but in spite of this drawback, the attendance was not much inferior to that of last year; and it is stated, probably with accuracy, that a still greater number of spec­ tators were present atthe Trent Bridge ground and at Kennington Oval on the occasion of the two matches between the premier counties of Surrey and Nottingham. Every year, too, fresh counties put in their claim to have representative teams in the provincial cham­ pionships : each school—old or new, large or small—has its eleven; and to gain the colours is as high an object of ambition with a schoolboy as a prize or a scholarship. All this looks like a permanent predominance among sports. But shrewd observers will tell you that to the million, football—with its simpler rules, its speedier results, its ever- changing action—is less caviare than the subtler excitements, the comparative tameness of cricket; while the fashionable crowd will gather to see players under twenty-one years of age, or lions from distant counties, but take no real interest in the game for its own sake. Writing, not so much from the point of view of a scientific student of the game as from that of one appreciative of its popular side, it must be confessed that there is some amount of truth in the assertion that the im­ provements in our cricket-grounds, and the alteration in the style of our bowlers, have made the game somewhat more mechanical and less amusing. The wickets are now as smooth as a billiard-table by comparison with those remembered by the elder generation where molehills, worm-casts, and even a mou^e-hole or two were not always avoided. “ He ne’er could pitch, but o’er a brow,” was the description of a famous bowler of the olden day. The hand, once held at the level of the knee when the ball was bowled at the wicket, has risen to the waist, the elbow, the shoulder (where round-arm bowling made a stop for some time, when Lillywhite no-balled the great Kentish bowler Willsher), and now the ball is generally delivered overhand at the highest stretch of the arm, with the simple limitation that it must not be thrown or jerked—a stipulation which some think might be abolished. The effect of this perpendicular delivery on a true wicket is, that the batsman, knows that so long as he can guard his stumps runs must come occasionally—are sure, indeed, to come in time; while the really dangerous balls which baffle his defence often just rise high enough to pass harmless over the bails. Thus the performance of a batsman in the present day, however brilliant in its culmina­ tion, always involves a tedious j^reface—be­ cause tha -minutice of the play must be tedious to the comparatively uninitiated bystanders, who applaud a “ leg-bye,” or a catch from a “ bump ball,” as if the one were a skilful “ draw,” or the other involved the dismissal of the batsman. Mr. Hornby and Mr. Thorn­ ton give more pleasure than Shrewsbury and ‘ Mr. Rock, because the event for which the public longs is sooner arrived at in the former than the latter instances ; while the old stager regrets to see loose balls let alone, and straight balls tamely blocked, which in his younger days would have been cut for four runs, or driven for two. It is a just measure of the French picturesque, that the author of a Parisian article on cricket should thus describe it :—“ The bowler, grasping the ball in his hand, watches for the favourable moment when the attention of the batsman is distract­ ed, and then launches it at him with incredible force; the batsman, however, is on the alert, he strikes it to an enormous height, and imme­ diately runs.” Yet absurd as this sounds, it is but a travesty of the kind of play which brings dowm gallery applause, where the mob (well dressed or ill attired, as the case may be) is wont to resort to in its thousands. Nevertheless, a “ bowlers’ match” is hardly the highest form of the game; the ideal lies, as usual* between two extremes, and to give rational pleasure, all parts of the play ought to be fairly in balance with each other. It is a suggestive fact that nearly half the runs in every innings are credited to two batsmen only, so that the assumed superiority of the bat over the ball is not so general as is sur­ mised. Nor does the other complaint that three d.ays are often insufficient to finish a match absolutely imply a want of power in the bowlers, when we remember for how much actual overwork steam is answerable; and how recious is a little interval of dawdle, or a alf-hour -subtracted from the beginning or the end of the day, to the player, stale with all-night travelling, and jaded with the per­ petual reiteration of the call upon physical power in one direction only, devoid of elastic­ ity, and craving above all things rest—the natural consequence of endeavouring to cram into six wording days the engagements of more. Should it he necessary to increase the height o.f the wicK^s, or to simplify the conditions under Which the fatal fiat “leg before” is given, our cricket legislation is ample for the pur­ pose, and the necessity once clearly proved, will no doubt take action. As the wicket has already had its dimensions altered several times, and the rules of the game have received constant modifications, there is nothing revolu­ tionary in such sugestions. It is more prob­ able and more desirable that the needful im­ petus to renewed interest in the game will come from greater successes in amateur bowling. Twice in the present generation has cricket ex­ perienced a decided revival: once, when Mr. Kempson taught gentlemen to make the ball their weapon as well as the bat; and again, more recently, from the “ demon” bowlers of Australia. Let public-school cricket-tutors take the hint. It will never do for cricket to lose its hold on the favour of all classes. Golf, archery, tennis, football, and “ all the single and the double” wheels have much to commend them as manly exercises; but there is no game so varied, so full of surprises, so good to school the temper and foster self control, as cricket; above all, there is no game so suitable to every rank and station in society, or in which repre­ sentatives of every class can join on those principles of social equality which are free from servility, insubordination, or jealousy. It has been truly described as a “ co-operative sport; ” it is confined to no stratum of rank, but is best practised where it is most fused. The advice of one of our gentlemen cricketers is worth repeating as a conclusion to these desultory remarks: “ Our noble game will cease to be the pure and genial pastime of our fathers, if their sons content them­ selves with looking on, instead of mixing with the practical element. Let not cricket descend to the inferior grade of a gladiatorial ex­ hibition—the trained combatant and the pam­ pered spectators. Let the amateur go hand in hand with professional, with one object in view—the maintenance of our game on its original principle”—a sport alike for the peer and the peasant, the parson and the parish­ ioner. C R ICK E T C U R IO S IT IE S OF 1886 . (Compiled from C r ick e t .) Jan. 2.—Melbourne. Fifth Australian Team v. Victoria. H. J. H. Scott and J. Mcllwraiih put on 200 for third wicket of former. A. H. Jarvis in first innings of Yictoiia had a hand in the fall of six of ten batsmen, stumping four and catching two. Jan. 2.—Melbourne. Fifth Australian Team v. Victoria. J. W. Trumble, in first innings of Victoria, at one time bowled nineteen consecutive maiden overs. Jan. 3.—Adelaide. Rosemont v. South Adelaide Juniors. Nation took all ten wickets of latter for 17 runs. Jan. 9.—Melbourne. Junior Fifteen v. Twelve of Port Melbourne. Par­ kinson took ten wickets of latter for 4 runs. He clean bowled the first nine wickets for no runs. Jan. .—Melbourne. Carlton v. East Mel­ bourne. Deeley, of Carlton, hit a ball to mid-on which went off the head of Bruce, who was fielding close up, and cannoning off to short-leg was caught there. March 6.—Adelaide. South Australia v. Victoria. Giffen took seventeen of the nineteen Victorian wickets which fell to the bowlers. April 15—Melbourne. Richmond v. Incog- niti. Four hours’ actual batting realised 5^2 runs, J. Roberts made 204 of 343 for Richmond. In one over he made 21, and his first hun­ dred were got under the hour. April 26.—Kennington Oval. Surrey y. Gloucestershire. The first Inter- County match played in Easter week as far as we know. One score of a hundred in first innings of each side, by Mr. Townsend’s 106 for Gloucestershire, and Abel’s 110 for Surrey. April .—Marrichville (S. A.) Marrichville (2) v. St. Peter’s, Surrey (2), Rey­ nolds, of former, went in third Next Issue February 24