Cricket 1894

870 (DKlCKEf's k WEEKLY EECORB OF THE 0AMEo SEPT. 6 , 1894 statistical tables week by week would carry out averages and analyses to two places of decimals. Some do, I know ; others do not. It is not a matter of serious moment, but yet there is some- thine; in it. For instance, take the York­ shire averages for all County matches played this y e a r; the paper I get gave Jackson's average as 28.14, Brown’s as 28 23; that puts the amateur easily in front. But the 14 and 23 are only the remainders in each case ; worked out decimally, their averages are 28.58 and 28.57, that is to say, in a hundred innings more Jackson would have scored just one run more than his rival. The one- hundreth fraction o f a run is too insig­ nificant to be noticed. I wish again, not to grumble, nor even to criticise, but most heartily to acknowledge this most useful piece of work done week by week now-a-days. Time was— and within my memory— when the announcement of the averages, etc., was made about six weeks after the season had closed. Almost the first serious piece o f work as soon as bats aud balls are stowed away, will be the meeting of the secretaries to draft n(xt year’s list o f matches. It will be no easy task with an enlargement o f the first-class county list, thirteen instead of nine, or rather let us venture to throw in Hampshire, which will bring the number up to fourteen. I have not gone into the matter, so I will content myself with asking whether it will be possible for every county to play every other. I refer to the limits of time. Of course another equally important item is the cost of such an extension of programme. It will not matter much to Surrey and Yorkshire, who both already meet all save Hamp­ shire, and Lancashire’s finances will be equal to any additional tax. What of less favoured counties ? What of those counties who at present have great difficulty in paying their way ? Could not the wealthier counties share the receipts and expenses of both the matches played against some counties ? It is very generous of me, I know, to be guilty of magnanimity of this sort, but I really can­ not see how it will be practicable otherwise to give every county 26 matches. And until the full qu ota falls to the lot of the counties concerned there will be endless bother and wrangling over the system of placing in the order of merit. The limit of twelve matches— six in and out—is decidedly too small, there must be at least sixteen or eighteen to qualify for a place. But even this may not work out satisfactorily. For instance, none of the present first-class counties will, I presume, forego or cancel any of their stock fixtures. Suppose, then, one of the new batch, not feeling strong enough to tackle the strongest of their rivals, or rich enough to take on all the thirteen, contents itself with matches against the other four promoted at the same time with i self, and against the four weakest of the older counties. I see no reason, on present form, why Warwick­ shire, playing such matches only, should not, be able to show an unbeaten record, whilst Gloucestershire, on the other hand, might next year produce no better results than have this year come their way. And what of these counties who play 26 matches and lose, say, 4 or 6 of them ? H ow place them in the competition relative to the 16-matches counties ? It is a bothersome business, as I fear we shall find until the list is made complete all round. Purists like myself can have no objec­ tion to the testimonials recently presented to C. I. Thornton and Captain W ynyard; we all say con am ore, Well done. By the laws regulating all sports, an amateur may take such a gift and violate no principle. I have never, however, under­ stood why money payments are not per­ missible in sport without the loss of social status. A lawyer, doctor, or parson does not hold it to be infra dig. to take a fee for services rendered over and above expenses incurred. Able and wealthy statesmen do not refuse a cheque for writing on subjects they do or do not understand. Everybody would laugh at the squeamishness of any who feared lest by so doing he might fall to the ranks of the professional. Why should cricket and sport generally be treated differently ? If, instead of writing on cricket, I choose to play cricket, am I less of a gentleman for being paid in the one case than I am in the other ? In these days of competition and reduced incomes it will become more and more difficult for the amateur proper to figure at cricket. It is our prudishness and snobbery combined that have made it possible for the amateur-professional to thrive in cricket and football. John Bull is nothing if not a Pharisee, and yet he professes to be straight, and is shocked and pained by suspicions of his integrity. I have been hoping the good, worthy worthy creature was getting reformed. It is bad enough when one County pays an amateur a salary of .£250 for playing cricket, though this sum is ostensibly given him for the discharge of official duties, which he no more fulfils than I do. Expenses are also allowed, and of the most liberal order, besides a free pass between his home and the county ground. Say what we will, he is simply the best paid professional in his county, though he comes out of the central gate of the pavilion, and gets an occasional touch of the cap from the professionals. About a month since I was asking a cricketer at a county match whether a certain pro­ minent amateur was likely to continue playing, as we were told business might interfere with his cricket. The laconic answer was returned : “ Play cricket, of course he w ill; he must, or else go to the workhouse; he has nothing else to depend on now ; have you not heard of the trouble his family have recently been passing through ? ” Dearly-beloved brethen, it will not wash. Isn’t it unmi­ tigated humbug ? The M.C.C. once pro­ fessed to take the matter in h an d; no man should henceforth be selected for the Gentlemen in their annual contest with the Player 3 who received more than his expenses for playing cricket. And yet, as one of our ablest pro’s, said tom e, “ some­ body got ten times as large a fee for going to Australia as any of us were offered.” Nothing will be done to remedy the present state of things until every amateur be required to send in his hotel bill, along with railway fare (first-class if you like), to the County and other treasurers, and receive the exact sum thus indicated. Up in our Yorkshire clubs when a man scores 50, he is entitled (in most clubs) to a money reward, not a bat. I am glad to say many men refuse to take it ; but when it is taktn, it is done so openly. Do let us, as Dr. Johnson said, “ clear our minds of cant.” The finish of the County Cricket season was uneventful enough, Kent being de­ prived of the chance of adding to their points through the limits o f time. The weather was not to blame, having turned out more favourably than in almost any other previous week of the whole summer. Against Sussex they delayed the closure too lon g; it could easily have been applied an hour earlier, and no great risk have been ru n ; but to leave only two- and-a-half hours in which to get Sussex out was to defeat the benefit of the closure. There was some capital batting, one man on each side registering his largest scores of the season, Marchant getting 85 and 60, Brann 58 and 41. The latter has been this year generally disappointing; he is a batsman trom whom one expects a big innings now and again ; witness his double century against Kent in 1892, 159 against Middlesex, and 120 against Somerset— both in 1893. The wet wickets seem to have taken all the life out of his more recent batting. Stewart, with a fine innings o f 90, started a very creditable week’s wcrk for Kent. Sussex wanted 153 runs to win, and only two wickets intact at the finish, the colt Butcher stopping in 50 minutes, though he only scored four runs— an instance of the barn-door style which cir­ cumstances abundantly justified. Parris took 12 wickets, and thus gave added proof that he should be a fixture in a team whose weakness has for many years been in this department of the game. Kent’s match with Notts was left un­ finished through the unconscionable time taken by the lace county players on the second day. Six-and-a-quarter hours con­ sumed in running up a score of 2341 Much more of this sort of thing will make it impossible for me to espouse the cause of Notts, and when I desert them they won’t have a solitary champion in­ side or outside their borders. Oh, it must have been painful even to admirers o f high-class batting. Daft was the chief offender, stopping in five-and-a-lialf hours for 91 (not out). Were the statisticians so annoyed that they determined to omit this innings from his aggregate ? Any­ how, the only two papers that have come into my hands take no notice of it, both giving 85 as his highest county score. Kent—who, as against Sussex, won the toss— did far better. True, they were 72 behind on the first hands, but they quickly set that all right, running up 260 (seven wickets) the second time. Bash- leigh gave Notts a splendid object lesson — let’s hope it won’t be lost upon them, incorrigible as they are ; he did not want more than 90 minutes to score 95 in— something like batting that, Stewart (7.9) putting in another able contribution.