Cricket 1894

Together joined in cricket’s man ly toil.”— Byron . N o. 3 7 4 VOL. X III. B' g stered for Transmission Abroad THURSDAY, SEPT. 0, 1894. P R IC E 2d. CRICKET NOTCHES. By t h e B e v . B. S. H o lm e s . A statement which went the round of the papers appeared recently to the effect that W .G . had in first-class cricket scored innings represented by every number between 1 and 100. This statement— whether a pure guess or the result of re­ search, I know not,probably aguess—pro­ voked a contradiction as to the numbers 87 and 93. The challenge was not met. Well, 98 1 know nothing of in connection with W .G .’s scores, nor does a very dear old friend of mine in London who may fairly be regarded as a “ Grace Directory,” inas­ much as he can reel off almost every innings scored by our Champion. I am off to Scarboro’ to day, partly with the view of tap­ ping another cricket ency­ clopaedia. But 87 appears among W .G .’s innings, viz., in the North v. South match at Prince’s on May 16, 1872, the same match in which Yardley made 73. Memor­ able enough that match, inasmuch as it was the first of importance played on the new ground down in Bel­ gravia, the largest and best appointed cricket enclosure in the Metropolis. Barratt, afterwards famous in the Surrey rauks, made his bow in first-class cricket in that match, playing for the North (Durham being his County), and taking eight wickets in the first and only innings of the South. The preceding year — 1871 —W .G . appeared for the first time on four different grounds up and down the country, viz., West Brompton, Trent Bridge, Mote Park, and Fenner’s, scored a century on three of them, whilst at Maidstone his scores were 81 (not out) and 42 (not out). But that was his way in those times. I shall be obliged by learning of any first-class match in which W .G. scored an innings of 93; he cer­ tainly has not done so in County cricket. By an oversight I forgot to refer last week to the incident in the Surrey and Kent match of the 21st ultimo, in which Lockwood dismissed Alec Hearne each time the first ball o f the innings. A cricket curio indeed. The only other parallel instance in first-class matches that comes to mind happened two years since,when Surrey met Middle­ sex ; then Lohmann got rid of the Middlesex captain the very first ball sent down in both innings, clean bowling him,however,once only. Many a cricketer, famous or otherwise as a batsman, has been out twice to the first ball lie lias received ; why even batsmen as dis­ tinguished as Felix and Tom Humphrey shared this fate, the former in a North v. South match in June, 1847, the latter when playing for Surrey v. M.C.C. in 1870. But Alec Hearne and A. J. Webbe have had, to the best of my knowledge, no rivals to their achievement. A friend was telling me of a match in which the closure was applied all too soon, as in the Sussex v. Hampshire match the other day. It was got up by a well-known Yorkshire amateur, H . Verelst, a veteran by this time. Well, his side scored 140 for the loss of four wickets, when the innings was closed, there being but an hour and a half’s further play, Imagine the astonish­ ment of those who had been deprived of a knock, when the first men in of their op­ ponents passed their incom ­ plete total in jast over an hour, neither being out. The closure is one of those simple-looking items that require amazing judgment, except of course where one side has an overwhelming advantage ; what, when it is so near a thing that a matter of ten runs or ten minutes may prove fatal to the captainwho has ventured to run the risk ? The most consummate instance of sound judgment combined with the rarest pluck was certainly displayed by Sur­ rey’s late captain at Leeds in 1892, when he had the courage to close Surrey’s second innings at 81, leaving Yorkshire 146 to get in just over two hourj. They failed by 17 only, and within four minutes of time. I don’t believe there was another captain living who would have done the same; and as it is a rule to judge every man by his greatest deeds in any department, so on that afternoon at Hardingley I agreed with a friend, as we walked from the ground to the station, that John Shuter was the most consummate general in the world. I wish that those who make it their business to draw up the ME. D. L. A. JEPHSON ( of t h e S c r k e y E l e v e n ) .