Cricket 1898

“ Together joined in Cricket’s manly toil.” — Byron. no. 495 . v o i. x T ii. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1898 pbioe aa. A CHAT ABOUT W . GUNN. Few men there are who, for the reason that they have adopted a style of batting peculiarly their own, have encountered such opposition as Gunn. In company with Shrewsbury he has been freely accused of crimes of the deepest dye— of deliberately driving away the crowds from Trent Bridge, of play­ ing entirely for his own hand, of wearying spectators and making critics yawn, of making the name of Notts a byword of reproach in the land. It is also pointed out to him that, with Shrewsbury, he is the inventor of the terrible system which recog­ nises in the pad a weapon o f defence at least as useful as the bat—a system which causes multitudes of co r r e s p o n d e n ts to write to newspapers suggesting an imme­ diate alteration in the law as to leg before wicket. Again, he is charged with leaving tempting off - balls alone, to the number of hundreds during a long innings, instead o f hitting at them with a possible chance of being caught out. It is doubtless very sad. But if Gunn were to issue an “ A pologia” he would probably say with regard to the first two and the fourth crimes that the accu­ sations are not true, and that as to the third he does not care a twopence. He would also observe that in stopping a ball with his pads, or in leaving an off-ball alone he is infringing neither the letter nor the spirit of the law. He might retaliate by saying that the bowler, who, knowing perfectly well that a batsman will not hit an off-ball if he sees in it a trap or will stop it with his pads if it breaks in suddenly, still bowls the ball, is deliberately and need­ lessly wasting the valuable time of the spectators. He would doubtless be inclined to think that what is sauce for the gander is also sauce for the goose. It is beyond question that Gunn has by his very many splendid inniDgs been of inestimable service to his side. With­ out him and Shrewsbury where would Notts have been even in the days when the bow ling of the team was deadly ? It is difficult to see what the spectator has to object to in an innings by Gunn. He is, perhaps, not an absolutely graceful bat, for a very big man always looks as if he were using a toy bat, but his strokes are masterful. Moreover, he generally puts plenty of powder behind the ball, and it will be noticed that when he is in, whether he is making runs at the rate of one a minute or twenty an hour, the fieldsmen are always making h e r o ic e x e rtio n s . There is no time to loaf while he is at the wickets. Be his inn­ ings long or shi rt, there is no period of it when a fieldsmtn can take a rest even for a moment. If Gunn only possessed the skill of Dr. Grace in the matter of placing the ball, he would have been the marvel of the age. Not that he does not know how to place a ball when occasion offers; it is only that in the long run he does not possess the art to perfection. As it is, the fieldsman nearly always has to move when the ball comes in his direction. Why, then, is he so often accused of play­ ing a tedious game ? The truth of the matter would seem to be, that if the spec­ tator is to enjoy him­ self to his fullest extent he must have constant change. He mast see wickets fall, or frequent big hits made. He likes a change of batsmen as >vell as a change of bowlers, and when he sees a man going on steadily for hour after hour, always playing the most beautiful cricket, never making a mistake, but"at the same time never doing any­ thing which can be described as “ phenomenal ” —well, then he feels that VV. GUNN. (From a Photo by R. Thule <6 Co., 66, Chancery Lane , London.)