Cricket 1901

C R IC K E T , MAY 23, 1901. “ Together joined in Cricket’s manly toil.”— Byron. No. 509. VOL. XX. THTJESDAY, MAY 23, 1901. PRICE 2d. A CHAT ABOUT ALBERT TROTT. It is with a pleasurable feeling that they are about to see something out of the common, that spectators watch Albert Trott going up to the wicket, whether he has a bat or the ball in his hand. R igh tly or w rongly he is credited with being a man who is always making experiments, which he has previously oarefully thought out, and there is thus an unusually keen desire to see him bat or bow l. Certain it is that his bow ling is quite unlike that o f anybody else, while his batting has all the attractiveness which is afforded b y a man who is not afraid to make use of his strength and height. Probably most people, while calling him an all-round player, would consider his bow ling as being his chief possession. H e is a bowler who is w ildly exciting and vastly disappointing by turns. It was in one of his disappointing moments that he always met the Austra­ lians in 1899, against whom he would naturally have will have occasion to think that he is a very greatly improved bow ler—and, in the manner of human beings of all classes, will most likely attribute his suc­ cess against them to having carefully studied their methods. When the captain of a scratch team is informed that one of his bowlers is of “ all sorts,” he generally, and naturally, liked to distinguish himself, for the Australians made no attempt to disguise the fact that they did not think much of him. I t seemed to most good judges that he failed against them because he was too anxious to bow l them all out at once, and, perhaps disconcerted b y his first want of success against them, he never really showed them what he could do. Be this as it may he made it quite dear to English batsmen that they were making a vast mistake if they thought that they, as well as the Australians, could treat him as though he were a commonplace bow ler, and his success was such that one could come to no other condusion than that he had not in any way done himself justice against the Australians. The odds are that the next Australian team which comes over (From a Photo i ALBERT TBOTT. 2t. W . Thomas , 41, Cheapside , London concludes that accuracy is not one of his man’s strong points. Now Trott is essentially a bow ler of “ all sorts,” but it is only true of him in a strictly limited sense that he is wanting in accuracy. If he had a desire to pitch a ball in about the same place for over after over he could probably do it without taking any great trou ble; but as a rule he does not rely on mere length. I f he thinks it necessary he w ill alter,his method a dozen times in an innings, for he has studied the strokes and peculiarities of most of the batsmen whom he has met, and is quite prepared to experiment with fresh ones. Like Lohmann and other great bowlers he is not afraid to bow l a loose ball in order to tempt a batsman to hit, and many of his wickets have been ob­ tained directly or indirectly through this. It would puzzle a critic to say whether he is a fast bow ler with a slow and medium paced ball, or a slow bowler with a medium paced and fast ball, or a medium paced bowler with a fast and slow ball. It all depends on circum­ stances. An excellent batsman once described to me his first experience of Trott in an M .C.C. d u b match, and as the description gives a very fair idea o f the wiles of the bow ler, it may well be given here. “ The beggar was b ow lin g down a hill with the w ind behind h im ,” he said. “ I could have sworn that the first ball which he gave me was goin g to be a slow, but it was a fast yorker, which nipped b y the leg stump before I even caught sight of the thing. So I was ready for anything when the next ball came, lt looked as if it were fast, and, b y Jove, it was. Fortunately it M t m y bat full pitch before I could move i t ; so I looked round as if I had only refrained from hitting it out of the ground through respect for Trott’s feelings. H ow I got through the over I don’t know, but there was something of everything in it, and I nearly always thought it was goin g to be something else. I managed to make a few runs off the other bow ler, who was one of your steady sort, and then Trott gave me a real loose one, which I hit to the boundary, although I half expected to