Cricket 1901

210 CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. J u n e 2 0 , 1 9 0 1 . noticed this and said, ‘ Oome to the nets with me and I w ill show you one thing which will improve your cricket fifty per cent.’ So on the next morning I went and he showed me just the change in the holding of the bat which you now ask me about.’ It may be a little thing, but it has helped me much this season. I have also learned-—this was one of C. B. F ry’s hints—to face the bow ler a little more than I did in former days; in this way one seems able to judge each ball better and play it on its merits.” “ What were the chief differences which you noticed between club and first-class cricket ? ” “ More than anything else I noticed that in club cricket one has so many more opportunities for leg glances and on-side play that one is apt to forget how to play on the off-side. There is not so much of the off-side theory about the bow ling in club cricket, and I cannot help thinking that not only would first-class cricket be all the better if more variety of bow ling were introduced, but there would be no changes needed in the laws of the game. One or tw o bowlers nsing the off-side theory would, I think, be sufficient in a team, and to some extent this is proved by the number of wickets taken in recent matches b y bowlers with a leg break. In club cricket you often get into the way of making strokes which may or may not be useful afterwards, because of some peculiarity in the ground. A t Boston Park, for instance, where I used to play, it is a three boundary if you hit to leg square, and I got into the way of waiting a little later for the ball, so that I m ight hit it finer and make a four.” Of Boston Paik cricket in days gone b y Mr. Beldam tells a story. “ A bats­ man,” he said, “ who had turned round to hit a ball which pitched some way outside tbe leg stump, missed it and was given out leg before. So he said to the umpire, ‘ Which leg did it hit ? ’ ‘ The left one,’ was the reply. ‘ W ell,’ said the batsman, ‘ look at i t ! I haven’t moved it an inch, and it isn’t anywhere near the front of the w icket.’ ‘ N o,’ replied the umpire, ‘ but the other one is ! ’ ” “ D o you remember what is the first match o f any importance in which you played ? ” “ It was for Luton against Bedford. Sharp, who afterwards plaj ed for Surrey, was on the Bedford side, and his name appeared very frequently in the s:ore. I think I made about 20 in each innings.” “ And your first b ig match ? ” “ This was two years ago when I played for Webbe’s eleven against Oxford University. I remember it well because I made a blob in the first innings, caught at the wicket, and what with that and a thunderstorm I hardly slept a wink during the night. When I went in again I was so thankful when I had saved the pair, that it almost felt like getting the hundredth run.” “ H ow was it that you did not play in first-class ciicket until last year ? ” “ W ell, I think that perhaps the chief reason is that I could never come off just when I thought it would be a good thing for me to make a b ig score in a certain match, and especially was I most un­ fortunate when playing with Webbe. But he was always most kind to me, and encouraged me in every way, and the fault lay in m y own over anxiety. At last I began to get very down hearted, and thinking that I should never come off, I told Webbe that I had been quite sufficiently tried in the Middlesex second eleven, and that it was of no use to try me any more. But Webbe, like W .G ., is always as keen as possible when he sees that a man is really trying—his first question when you tell him about a new man is ‘ What’s he like in the field ? ’ — and one day he asked me to skipper the second eleven against Lancashire second eleven in his enforced absence. This was the turning point. I had so much to think about in connection with my duties that I had no time to worry about myself, and I g o t some runs and also some wickets. M y brother always chaffs me about being prompt to seize the first opportunity of putting myself on to bow l, but I really did wait until there was a reasonable excuse.” “ D o you think that you have learned anything since you began to play in first- class cricket ? ” “ Oh yes. There was, and is, such a lot to learn ! I carefully watched the best players, many o f whom have been kind enough to give me useful hints, and I particularly remember a few which were given me b y F ry last year in the London County match against Surrey. I t is the best possible instruction to watch men like W . G., Banjitsinhji, MacLaren, Fry, Hayward, and Warner when they are batting. For some time tbe scoring board in use in big matches was a stumbling block in my way ; it was very difficult not to watch it and try to improve one’s figures. The large number of spectators at a big match was also a little upon m y nerves at first, especially when they strongly objected to m y slow rate of scoring, but I soon got used to it. I told Jessop once that he was responsi­ ble for this sort o f thing, and that if he hadn’t set such a shocking example of making a hundred in a few minutes, we methodical players would have been left in peace.” “ What coaching did you have when you were a boy ? ” “ None whatever in the usual accept­ ance of the term ; I wish I had. But when I was a very little boy, not more than seven or eight years old, m y uncle used to bow l to me, and he always says that I never would own that I was out. H e says that it is a fact that one day he bow led me, knocking a stump out of the ground, and that I stolidly affirmed that I was not out. I am not sure that I have not got level with him. We always tell him that when he is given out leg before, which is not infrequently, he expresses the most absolute astonishment and asks ‘ W h a t! ’ in tones of incredulous surprise. One day I took a snapshot of him, with m y father standing behind the wicket in an attitude of appealing to the umpire. I told my father how to stand, and then turning to m y uncle I said, ‘ There is no need to tell you what to do. Just imagine that you have been given out leg-before-w icket.’ The result was a snapshot in which the ball is just hitting his leg (placed well in front of the wicket) while he looks up with an air of the greatest surprise and indignation. But the story does not end here. I sent one of the photographs down to Little- hampton, where, some time after, my uncle found himself playing in a match. H e was given out leg before, and when he afterwards in the pavilion expressed his horrified amazement that such a decision should be possible in an enlight­ ened country, the photograph was solemnly placed before him, and he was told that no further proof of his iniquities could possibly be needed.” “ Did you play much cricket at school?” “ It was arranged that I should go to Eton, but m y father was advised (ill- advised I think) not to send me there, as I should never do any work if there was any cricket in m e ! So I went to a private school at Luton. Here the only coaching that I received, as coaching, was a piece of advice from an old professional, John Long, of Luton. He told me, ‘ When you are hitting to leg put your leg right in front of the ball and hit for all you are worth.’ A t Luton I made m y first hun­ dred—the score was 153—and I remember it the more b tciu se when the other side, Oxford House, St. Alban’s, won the toss, their captain said, ‘ Oh, w e’ll put you in .’ I was dumbfounded at this, for as captain of the school I had never come across a similar experience, and the wicket was in splendid order. Ih e y told me afterwards that they put us in first beciuse ‘ if we had gone in first you would never nave got us o u t ! ’ " It may have been noticed that Mr. Beldam always gauges his block b y measuring with his bat when he first goes to the wicket. He has a reason for this. “ I well remember,” he said, “ hit­ ting the off stump half way up my bat in a match at Littlehampton when I was attempting to make a cut. On my return to the pavilion for a blob, m y father, who was always very anxious to see me and m y brother do well, said, ‘ However did you do that ? I could have played that ball better m y self! ’ As it was j ust lunch- time I went out and measured the dis­ tance between the creases, for I had my suspicions, and found that it was three feet six inches, instead of four feet. So after that I have always measured the distance with my bat.” As a bowler Mr. Beldam is very keen, and he is trying to develop a medium-paced leg-break. His experience of bow ling in first-class cricket is somewhat amusing. “ Once Ust year,” he said, ‘ I was put on b y W . G. at the Palace to bow l to Hayward when he was at 90, and I have always felt that I then reached the crowning point of my career as a bowler, for as luck would have it, I got him out when he had just reached three figures. In fact I believe that up to the end of May last year, only two men had got Hayward out, and it was a source o f great delight to me to think that I was one of them. I have never bow led since