Cricket 1898

J a n . 27, 1898. CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. 3 M r. S to d d a rt’s J. R. Mason, b McKibbin... 3 A. C. MacLaren, c Trumble, b McKibbin .................35 Wainwright,eJones,b Noble 21 K.S.Ranjitsinhji,bTrumble 71 Haywar3, e Jones, b Trott 23 Storer, c. Kelly, b Trumble 51 Hirst, b Joncs ............... . 0 N.F. Druce, lbw, b Trumble 44 Hearne (J. T.),b Jones ... 1 Briggs, not out .................45 Richardson, b Trumble ... 3 Extras........................18 b Trumble.......... 3 cTrott, bTrumble 38 b Noble ... ... 11 b Noble ..........27 cTrumble,bNoble 33 cTrumble.bNoble 1 lbw, b Trumble 3 cMcLeod,bNoble 15 c Jones, b Noble 0 cTrott,bTrumble 12 not out................. 2 Extras .......... 5 Total ...315 Total. ...ItO A ustralia . R. W r 1 R. W. Richardson . ..........114 1 Mason .......... 33 1 Hirst ... ......... 89 1 1Hayward............ 23 1 Briggs ... ......... 96 3 1Storer................. 55 1 Hearne ... . ..........94 1 Hirst bowled a no-ball, Briggs a wide. M r . S to d d a rt’s Team. R. W. R. W. Trumble ... .......... 52 4 ............................. 53 4 McKibbin .......... 66 2 .............................. 13 0 Jones .......... .......... 54 2 ........................ T rott.......... ............ 50 1 ............................. 17 0 Noble.......... ............ 31 1 ............................. 49 6 McLeod ... ......... 44 0 ............................. 13 0 McKibbin bowled three no-balls and Jones one. THE BALLARAT MATCH (XVIII.) ( t w e l f t h of th e to u r ). Played, at Ballarat on Jan. 7 and 8. Drawn. The home team went in first. Wright showed remarkable form for 60. At the end of the first day’s play the score was 283; Ham was not out 23. Richardson took five wickets for 26, Briggs two for 66, Mason one for 14, Storer three for 62, Stoddart one for 43, Hirst one for 47, Wainwright one for 18. On the second day, Mason scored 58 for the Englishmen, Stoddart 111, Wainwright 26, Druce 21, MacLaren 37, and Hirst 59. The total was 342. Ranjitsinhji, who was playing, did not bat owing to an attack of asthma. The home team had scored 11 for three wickets when stumps and the game was drawn. THE STAWELL MATCH (XXII.) ( t h ir t e e n t h of t h e to u r ). Played at Stawell, Victoria, on Jan. 10 and 11. Drawn. On a matting wicket the Englishmen went in. The innings lasted all day and produced 214 runs. Druce made 48, Stoddart 44, MacLaren 43, Board 33, Briggs 20, and Ranjitsinhji not out 1. The home team easily beat the total of the Englishmen, although no very big scores were made, J. W. Trumble scored 25, Nicholls, the old Oxonian 48, Rusden 49, Goldsworthy 24. When the game was drawn the score was 233 for 16 wickets. THE THIRD AUSTRALIA MATCH. FOURTEENTH OF THE TOUR. Played at Adelaide on Jan. 14, 15,17,18 & 19. Australia won by an innings and 13 runs. For this match Giffen was not asked to play, and the only alteration in the Australian team which was victorious at Melbourne was that Howell took the place of McKibbin. As the weather seemed certain to be fine while the match, lasted there was not much fear that the Adelaide wicket would follow the example of that at Melbourne and crumble. Stoddart lost the toss. Up to and including this match the Australians had enjoyed the privilege of going in first in all the big matches except one. So well did Darling and McLeod open the innings that they nearly put on a hundred before the latter was disposed of for a Bannermanlike, but useful score of 31. For nearly the whole of the rest of the day the spectators had the pleasure of seeing Clement Hill and Darling, two South Australians, obtain a complete mastery over the English bowling, which lacked variety as well as excellence. Richardson was again dis­ appointing. So much depended on him that when he could make no impression on the batsman, it became a case of hoping for the best, for no one else seemed capable of bringing the innings to a close. The score rose fairly quickly to 150, then to 200, and was only five short of 250 when Hill was caught by Storer off Richardson, who at last was fortunate enough to get a wicket. Hill had played a splendid game for 81. Gregory came in and no other wicket fell that afternoon, the score when stumps were drawn having been raised to 310 for only two wickets. Darling was not out 178. He had of course been batting all the day, and had never played quite such a perfect innings before. This was pretty bad from an Englishman’s point of view, but experience had shown that despite such a good beginning the score might not reach to alarming proportions. Never­ theless, it was on the cards that the visitors might spend all the next day in disposing of a couple more batsmen. Fortunately for them Darling was out in the first over, caught at the wicket off Richardson just as Hill had been, so that one of the most dangerous men in the team was no longer to be feared. But Iredale and Gregory made a good stand, raising the total from 311 to 374 before Gregory was caught at the wicket, three men out of four thus falling into the hands of Storer. Gregory was in his best form. Then for the first time in the match a partnership only lasted a few minutes, Trott being bowled by Hearne. Noble, Trumble and Kelly all made use­ ful scores, while Iredale got into the eighties in three hours and a quarter. During the day only 242 runs were made, which is about as slow work as need b e ; when stumps were drawn on the Saturday evening nine wickets were down for 552. On Monday morning the last wicket gave a little trouble, but the end of the innings was at last reached for a total of 573. When the Englishmen went in to bat they could not plead that they were tired out by the two day’s fielding, because they had been able to rest on the Sunday. But the batting was most disappointing. A shockingly bad start made, for MacLaren, Mason, Ranjitsinhji, and Storer—four of the five best batsmen in the team—were out for 42. After this Druce made his usual 20 in good style, and Hirst then made a very valuable stand with Hayward at a very critical time. When he went in the score was 106 for five wickets; at the close of the day it was 197 for six, and Hirst was still in, having just made his 50. Hayward in the meantime had given a specimen of what he is like in England, and his 70 was worthy of all praise. On the fourth morning the tail, with about 250 runs to make to save the follow-on, made a plucky effort. Hirst still continued to play a great game and was the third man in the match to make over 80. The rest all did fairly well, with the exception of Hearne, but if Stoddart had been the Stoddart of old he might have turned the tide. Howell and Noble, the two latest additions to the Australian side, were very successful with the ball. Following on nearly 300 runs in arrear, the Englishmen lost Mason at once ; his scores in the last two great matches are 3 and 3, 11 and 0, which shows how greatly he is out of form just at present, if the visitors were now to save the game it was pretty clear that both Ranjitsinhji and MacLaren must be in great form, for there was nobody else likely to make the sort of scores which were necessary on such an occasion. For a time there were hopes; the two famous batsmen gave a brilliant exhibition of cricket and the score mounted rapidly until it reached 150. By this time they seemed to have such complete control over the bowling that almost anything was possible ; and then in a moment the for­ tunes of the game were entirely changed. Ranjitsinhji was out to McLeod for a superb 77, and in another over or two Hayward and Storer were both dismissed by the same bowler. The score when stumps were drawn was 161 for four wickets. Such a sudden and wholly un­ looked-for change pointed to an inning’s victory for the Australians, and it was certainly all Lombard Street to a German missionary that they would in any case win very easily. Nearly all the men who were likely to make many runs had gone, with the exception of MacLaren, who was not out 70 at the close of the day. He continued to play a great game, somewhat slow, as was only natural under the cir­ cumstances. On the following morning, the fifth day of the match, he gradually increased his score to 124. Meanwhile Druce played his usual useful innings of between 20 and 30, and Stoddart seemed in good form although he only scored 24. MacLaren went at 262, after an innings of which he may indeed be proud, and the game was practically over. On all sides it is admitted that the bowling of McLeod and Noble was exceedingly good but that there was nothing the matter with the wicket. A ustralia . C. McLeod, b Briggs... 31 J. Darling, c Storer, b Richardson ... ...178 C. Hill, c Storer, b Richardson ......... 81 S.E. Gregory, c Storer, b Hirst ......... ... 52 F. A. Iredale, b Rich­ ardson .................84 G.H.S.Trott, b Hearne 3 M r. S to d d a rt’s A. C. MacLaren, b Howell 14 J. R, Mason, b Jones... ...11 K. S. Ranjitsinhji, c Noble, bTrum ble............... . .. 6 M. A. Noble, b Rich­ ardson .............. 39 H. Trumblo, not out 37 J. J. Kelly, b Stoddart 22 E. Jones, run out ... 8 W. Howell, b Heame 17 Extras.................21 Total ...573 T eam . c Kelly, b Noble 124 e Jones, b Noble 0 c T ru m b le , b McLeod ... ... 77 c and b McLeod 1 c Hill, b McLeod G Hayward, b Jones ..........70 Storer, b H ow ell................. 4 N. F. Druce, c Darling, b N o b le ...............................24 b Noble ............27 Hirst, c Trumble, b Noble 85 lbw, b McLeod ... 6 A. E. Stoddart, c Jones, b Howell ............... ... 15 c Jones,bMcLeod 24 Briggs, e Kelly, b Noble ...14 notout................. 0 Hearne (J. T.), b Howell ... 0 c and b Noble ... 4 Richardson, not out ..........25 c Jones, b Noble 0 Extras........................10 Extras............13 Total ..278 Total ...282 N E X T ISSUE , T H U R S D A Y , F E B R U A R Y 24.