Cricket 1887

430 C R IC K E T : A F E E K L Y RECORD OF THE GAME . SEPT. 22,1887. THE END OF THE SEASON. (F r o m Baily's Magazine f o r S e p te m b e r .) T h o u g h at the time of writing the last fixture of the county season has yet to be decided, as far as one can judge the positions of the fore­ most competitors are not likely to be altered, and, indeed, we are justified in assuming that the places of the leaders are finally determined for this year. Except for a few weeks during the earlier part of the summer, when neither Yorkshire nor Notts were seen quite at their best, the real interest in the struggle, for the chief honours of the season has been centred in the doings of the two northern shires just named, and of Surrey, Lancashire, and Mid­ dlesex in the order named. Middlesex, though it has not for the last few years played the important part in county cricket one would expect it to play from its vast resources, has, on the whole, this summer, under the skilful management of Mr. A. J. Webbe, proved itself to be little, if at all, in­ ferior to the most formidable of the northern shires who have for so long, with the excep­ tion of last year, when Surrey’s claims were as good as those of any other candidates, practi­ cally enjoyed a monopoly of what honours fall to those who are regarded as the most suc­ cessful county team of the year. Southern cricket has, during the last year or so, shown a material improvement, and at the present time it is satisfactory to feel that a match between representative teams of the north and south would now be anything but the unequal contest it really was for several summers. Gloucestershire, Kent, and Sussex have none of them been very successful this season, but Surrey and Middlesex have, on the other hand, thoroughly upheld the character of southern cricket, and the brilliant record of the former has, as it was in 1886, been one of the most interesting features of a more than usually uneventful campaign. Up to a certain time, in fact, the Surrey eleven were well-nigh invincible, and with the exception of their one defeat at the hands of Middlesex at the Oval, one of the greatest sur­ prises, perhaps, of the season, their match list showed an unbroken list of successes, that is in inter-county fixtures. We should fancy, indeed, that no eleven certainly of late years has been able to show such a series of remark­ able triumphs, and an analysis of the doings of the various county teams of 1887 cannot fail to give special prominence to the many deci­ sive victories achieved by the Surrey eleven during the last four months. Until the return match with Kent, com­ pleted quite recently, not one of the fixtures undertaken by Surrey had been undecided, and while it is worthy of remark that the eleven, so ably led by Mr. John Shuter, have beaten every other county once this season, their successes have included two one innings victories over Yorkshire and Derbyshire, and one victory as decisive over Gloucestershire, Middlesex, Kent, and Lancashire. It must be remembered, too, in considering an apparent deterioration of form in some of the later fixtures that during the heavier jjart of the programme in A u g u st, when they were en­ gaged in really the most important contests of the year, they were unlucky in having to play without, perhaps, their best all-round cricketer, M:\ W. E. Roller, whose batting had been one of the most noteworthy features of the first half of the programme, as well as of Jones, an always reliable and useful bowler, and later on of Beaumont, who had proved himself without a doubt to be one of the very best bowlers in the team. Just for a time, in the middle of August, the Surrey team were not seen to the best advan­ tage, and their narrow victory over Sussex at Brighton, followed as it was by a somewhat disappointing show during the first part of the next match against Derbyshire, led many to believe that the eleven were training off, in fac% to use an expression common in cricket parlance, were played out. On the whole, though, the record of the Surrey eleven during August was by no means an inglorious one, even if it cen hardly be said that they alto­ gether maintained the reputation they had gained in the earlier fixtures. Though they had all the worst of the part of the return match with Kent, they played up so well subse­ quently that the game was left unfinished, with really little or nothing to favour either side: as evenly drawn a game, in fact, as it would be possible to conceive. The only other occasion on which they did not have quite the best of the play at the finish was against Lancashire, and here, it must be confessed, the all-round cricket of the eleven was distinctly below their usual standard. The ground, it must be admitted, had been too copiously watered just before the match began, and though we have not the smallest desire to detract in the smallest de- ree from a brilliant and thoroughly well- eserved success of the Lancashire eleven, as far as one could judge,, the faulty condition of the wicket at the outset was answerable for the actual completion within the stipulated time. On the other hand, as that particular game went, it was freely conceded that the better side won, and the excellent all-round cricket of the Lancashire team on that occa­ sion was some of the very best seen on the Surrey ground this summer. Surrey’s greatest achievement of all, though, was its double victory over Noits, and it is very long, we should fancy, since any county was able to make the same boast, that it had beaten Notts twice in the same year. In each case, too, it cannot be too clearly pointed out that the match was played under fairly equal conditions, and that the result should not, with any reason, be attributed to an unfair proportion of luck on both occasions; indeed, in the return match at the Oval, Surrey had to play up their very hardest to win, and their performance was distinctly of a high order of merit. A score of 204 is never, at any period of the game, an easy one to go in against, but the difficulty is, of course, materially increased when a side has to make such a large number at the end of the match, and that the Surrey eleven did accomplish such a task in the fourth innings, and against such excellent bowling and fielding as is to be found in the Notting­ hamshire team, testified fully to their capacity for playing an up-hill game. One of the most gratifying, too, of these re­ collections of this same match between Surrey and Notts at the Oval, was the unmistakable evidence of the universal interest taken by the public in the higher kind of cricket. Hitherto the best records in the matter of attendances had been furnished by the Australian teams, and those who remember the first meeting between England and Australia, towards the close of the season of 1880, when upwards of twenty thousand paid for admission to the ground on the opening day, will be able to un­ derstand the extent of the numbers present at the Oval on the last Bank Holiday, when we state that the attendance showed a consider­ able advance on the best previous register at the Oval. It will be interesting, indeed, to place on permanent record that as many as 5l,G07 persons paid the entrance fee at the gate, an aggregate for the three days far in excess of anything ever recorded, as far as we are aware, in any inter-county, or, indeed, in any important fixture, including even the most eagerly discussed of Australian fixtures. Surrey’s success, too, was the more noteworthy because, in the absence of Mr. Roller and Jones, its bowling was considerably weakened, and though Scotton was for once not included in the team which did duty for Notts, with this one exception the northern players were in their full strength. Although in the absence of Mr. A. G. Steel Lancashire has been unable to put quite its full strength in the field during the latter part of the season, it has, on the whole, fully upheld the reputation it won some years since, when it went through an arduous campaign unde­ feated. The Lancashire team has just lately been materially strengthened by the infusion of some new' and very promising talent, and in F. Sugg, who, after playing for Yorkshire and Derbyshire in turn, is qualified under the re­ sidential clause for Lancashire, Mr. J. Eccles and Mr. G. Jowett, it has three batsmen who have already proved themselves capable cricketers, and who, in all probability, will be of material use to their county. Mention has already been made of the most creditable victory of the Lancashire team over Surrey at the Oval, and though, at the time of writing, they seem to have all the worst of their en­ gagement with Yorkshire at Manchester, Mr. Hornby has reason to be gratified with the result of the season which shows Lancashire to be quite in the front of county cricket. The Lancashire team, too, are deservedly popular, for they always play the game from first to last, and, unlike some elevens whose main idea seems to be to draw, their cricket is always of a kind to attract instead of weary a long-suffering cricket public. The performances of the Yorkshire eleven during the closing stages of this season have been at times most brilliant, at others pingularly disappointing. The remarkable scoring of Hall, Ulyett and Lee, entitled them to claim the credit of more than one achieve­ ment without a parallel, and, in fact, their extraordinary run-getting during the first week or so of last month wrill rank among the most sensational feats of a season singularly prolific of high scores. They would have had easy victories over Kent at Canterbury, and over Lancashire at Bradford in all probability, had time admitted of the completion of those games, and though, under the ordinary system of analysing the doings of the various counties, drawn matches, however much the draw may be in favour of a side, are not reckoned of any account, still the excellent show of the York­ shire team on the two occasions named must be of some value in estimating the season’s doings. On the other hand, the record of Yorkshire’s cricket in August suffers materially from the poor show made by the eleven against Middle­ sex at Huddersfield, against Sussexat Brighton, and against Surrey at the Oval. Rain, un­ doubtedly, so far at least as any one can speculate on the probabilities of cricket, saved them from a defeat at the hands of Middlesex, and time was equally their friend at Brighton, where Sussex had decidedly the best of the drawn game. At the Oval, though fortune was not able to befriend them in the same way, and though they went in first and ought to have had the best of the luck, as the wicket was just recovering from recent rains, they allowed Surrey to get so much the best of the game on the first day that the game was practic­ ally over before aball was bowled on the second morning. Their all-round cricket in the last two matches against Notts at Sheffield and Lancashire at Manchester redounds materially to the credit of the Yorkshire eleven, and considering the quality of the opposition in each case, the results cannot fail to have been gratifying to the supporters of the Yorkshire Club. Their matches with Notts have always been singnlarly interesting, but the finish of the last meeting certainly eclipsed anything recorded in these contests of late years, and the Yorkshiremen deserve the highest praise for the plucky attempt they made to win. When stumps were finally drawm Yorkshire had still three runs to get to win with two wickets still in hand: but it must be stated that four batsmen practically threw their wiokets away in the hope of getting the required runs in time, knowing, moreover, that there was really no chance.of losing the game. Hall, Ulyett and Lee, by their brilliant play, conduced chiefly to the favourable position Yorkshire gained on several important occasions of late, but the batting of the tail has not been of a very high order, and, on the whole, there has been an uncertainty about the run-getting powers of the team which was equally manifest in their play during the seasons of 1885 and 188G. Since Peate’s retire­ ment from the eleven, the bowling, too, has not been by any means so deadly, and the out- cricket generally this summer would contrast very unfavourably with that of some other N E X T IS SU E , OCTOBER 27.