Cricket 1896

20 CRICKET: A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. F e b . 27, 1896. Jones on these figures, which, after all, only represent a part of their work in first-class matches. McKibbin has done two or three really big things in tlie bowl­ ing line, notably in the Christmas Inter­ colonial at Melbourne—the score of which appears elsewhere in this number of Cricket —and in the Queensland match at Brisbane last season. He is said to have a good break both ways, and should certainly prove one of the stock bowlers of the team. Up to the end of the season of ’94-5, Donnan had played 52 com­ pleted innings in first-class matches in Australia, and had scored 1,260 runs— average 24'23. Harry had had 34 innings and had scored 827 runs—average 24’32. Darling had scored 925 runs in 25 innings —37. Iredale, 1,590 in 47—33-82. The figures of Giffen, Lyons, Harry Trott, and Gregory would also be improved in a greater or less degree by the inclusion of their scores in intercolonial matches ; but these men are too well known in England for any misconception as to their form to be likely to arise. Ou his form of the present season, Donnan is somewhere near being the best batsman in Australia. He is a representative of the careful style, and should prove a worthy successor to Bannerman, though he does not by any means carry the “ block-block-block ” system so far as did A. C.B. Perhaps on the whole it is a good thing young Clement Hill has not been chosen, though I have no manner of doubt that his omission has been received with great disfavour at Adelaide. He is no more than a boy as yet—not quite nineteen, I believe—and it may well be doubted whether the strain of a long tour might not prove physically detrimental to him. Most of us can remember how piucky little Syd Gregory’s batting fell off after the first six weeks or so of the 1890 tour. So far as the inter-colonial matches yet played during this Australian summer have shown, Albert Trott is scarcely in his best form ; and this may be some justification for his omission, but I should have imagined that Lyons would have been chosen, in form or not. There is not a man on the side more likely than the burly John James to pull a game out of the fire. Leaving Australian cricket for a time, I must just spare a few lines to the first of the three matches of Lord Hawke’s Team against South Africa, that played at Port Elizabeth on the 13th and 14th of this month. I frankly own that I am extremely disappointed by the poor show made by the Afrikanders. It is difficult to understand how men like Lieutenant Poore (who had made two centuries in minor matches against the team), Frank Hearne, Routledge, Halliwell, and Sin­ clair, should fail so conspicuously to maintain the form they had shown in less important games. That forty minutes or so of play in which ten wickets went down for 30 runs, will need a lot of wiping out in the two remaining matches. From an English point of view how­ ever, the match has more than one pleasant feature. After being told that Lord Hawke was too unwell to captain the team, one is pleased to see that he was Well enough to run up 30 in the second innings. The success of Messrs. “ Sam” Woods, Charles Wright, and Hill, is also gratifying. But above and beyond everything else—and that not alone to Surrey partisans—stands out the bowling of George Lohmann. Fifteen wickets for 45 runs is indeed a not­ able performance, ranking among the best that G. A. L. has ever done. I can only remember one other occasion on which he took as many wickets in a first- class match—in Surrey v. Sussex, at Brighton, in 1889, when he had the same number at a cost of 98. It is a pity that he should have scored “ a pair of them ” in the Port Elizabeth game. But this is not a new experience to George. If I remember rightly, he was debited with a similar performance in a Gentlemen v. Players match in 1888. My cricket average list tells me that Lohmann had, up to the end of the English season of 1895, scored in all first-class matches at home and abroad 6563 runs in 346 completed innings— average 18'94; and had bowled 65,536 balls for 22,867 runs and 1659 wickets, average 13-78. Those who find their figures with regard to Lohmann’s per­ formances differing from mine may hereby take note that I consider Surrey v. Hants and Surrey v. Somerset in 1885 as first-class matches. I believe I am correct in saying that Cricket —and not Cricket only, but almost every other paper whose opinion carried any weight— so considered them at the time ; and I take that to be sufficient reason for ranking them first-class now. It was after the season of 1885 that an agreement was come to among the various papers which reported first-class cricket at length as to what were and what were not first-class counties. The Press was the only tribunal for the settlement of such matters at that time; and my own opinion, not to be told in Gath or published in the streets of Askelon, is that it performed its task somewhat better than the M.C.C. now does it. The difficulty of differentiation between first-class matches and those falling just below that rank is not a small one. I have been recently engaged upon the making out of a complete list of first-class matches played during the last twenty years, and have found the task one bristling with difficulties. I don’t intend to submit my list to anyone for revision, because I know that no two of my fellow critics would think alike about it. The question as to Somerset and Hampshire being first-class between the early seven­ ties and 1885 would I suppose be un­ hesitatingly answered with a negative by our friend Mr. Holmes. But W.G. considers them as having been so far at least some part of that time, vide the averages in his book; and if I may be allowed to say sp, I feel fairly assured that our worthy Editor would be disposed to agree with him. „ . , Coming nearer to the present time, the Liverpool and District matches have been the cause of a lot of confusion. I am in­ clined to wish that Liverpool had never put a team into the field. Her matches with the Australians have always been allowed to rank first-class. Her one match with the South Africans did not, because none of the South African matches was so considered. So far so good ; this is at least intelligible. I am by no means an upholder of the theory that every match in which one first-class side is en­ gaged is necessarily to be ranked first- class. But, taking Wisden as my standard, I find that Yorkshire v. Liverpool and District was included in the first-class averages in 1890 and 1894, and was not so included in 1887, 1889, and several other years. Thus J. T. Brown gets the benefit of a score of 141 made in 1894, and Louis Hall and Wardall, who made centuries in another of these games, are ruled out of court. The reason given, I fancy, was that the match was an un­ official one in the other years, but in 1890 and 1894 was arranged by the Yorkshire Committee, like the other Yorkshire matches. Cambridge University v. Liver­ pool and District was first-class in 1894, but, by ruling of the M.C.C., was not in 1895; Mr. Frank Mitchell thus losing the credit of a fine score of 155, which would have placed him among the thousand-run scorers. Personally, I would prefer taking a broader view of matters. Liverpool being able to put practically a first-class team into the field, I would consider all her matches against first-class teams as worthy to rank. At least, the team she generally gets together is as strong as the Dublin University eleven, which the M.C.C. says is first-class. I would also have considered the principal matches of the Afrikanders as first-class, since the greater part of their programme was made up of games with admittedly front- rank teams. I would take Surrey v. Scotland and Gloucestershire v. Scotland as first-class. Of course, I know that in 1892 Surrey gave Scotland two tremendous drubbings; and the outcry against in­ cluding the Surrey men’s figures in these games was so great that the matter was referred to the M.C.C., who decided against their inclusion. But I think it bad form to refuse to allow any match one side in which was not English (except the Australian matches, whose rank one can scarcely dispute) to be con­ sidered as of first-class importance simply by reason of that fact. There are first - class cricketers outside the fourteen first- class counties, the Universities, the M.C.C., and the three great Australian colonies; and when Scotland makes an effort to put a good team into the field against an English county, it would be no more than ordinary courtesy to include the game played among the important matches of the year. Surrey has beaten Sussex and Oxford University more heavily than she beat Scotland ; but no one Cavils at the inclusion of matches between her and Sussex or the Dark Blues. I have been led into a somewhat longer digression than I had intended. This is a subject to which I should like at some future time to devote a whole article. A NEXTi JSSUE, THURSDAY, MARCH 26th.