Cricket 1902

CRICKET, APRIL 10, 1902. “ Together joined in Cricket’s manly toil.”— Byron. *ro. 593 . voi». x x i. TH U R SD AY , A P E IL 10 , 1 9 0 2 . p r i c e 2 a. A C H A T A B O U T W. W. ARMSTRONG. Of the five new members of the Aus­ tralian team now nearing England it will be no disparagement to. the rest to speak of Warwick Armstrong as the player of the greatest interest to English cricketers at the moment. “ Victoria’ s young batsman with a future,” this is how he had been described by one of the most capable of Austra­ lian critics. Not that he is a batsman and nothing else, be it added. On the con­ trary, on his cricket during the last Australian season he is an all-round player of undoub ted ly great possibilities. That great home reputations have not always been confirmed over here, it is hardly necessary to add. In the present case there is no reason to believe that the public form of Australian cricket, and form fully maintained as the result of a lengthy test, will be in any way belied. Like so many Australian cricketers, Armstrong is an all-round player. His first taste of senior cricket in Victoria was in the season of 1898-99. As a batsman, he made his mark at once with several big scores for the South Melbourne Club, the best of them 178 v. St. Kilda. Even then he was regarded as a player with a future, for he was chosen later in the season to repre­ sent Victoria in the two minor Intercolonial matches against Tasmania and New Zealand. His all round cricket in the former, too, was distinctly above the average, for he not only made runs in f ood style, but was fairly successful as a owler. The next season found him a full fledged Intercolonial player. In both the matches in which he played for the Sheffield Shield [against South Australia and New South Wales he more than justified the general belief in his future as a batsman, playing good and attrac­ tive cricket on each occasion. By the end of the following season, that of 1900-1, he had come quite to the front as one of Victoria’s all-round players. In inter-colonial matches he could do no wrong, or very little. The South Austra­ lian bowlers in particular had reason to remember him that season. In both matches he got over a hundred, though his 118 at Adelaide was much the better of the two displays. In respect of quality, though perhaps neither was quite as good as his first score of 50 against New South Wales in the Christmas Inter-colonial at Melbourne. Here he showed his real grit as a bat on a very bad wicket, one so bad indeed that eight of the side could only make seventeen runs between them. His record against Mr. Maclaren’s team will be thoroughly familiar to Cricket readers. In their first match against Victoria the wicket was all in favour of the ball, and he failed, as most of the batsmen, against Barnes’ bowling. It was the second test match which brought him conspicuously to the notice of the English cricket public as a player of great resource as well as pluck. The game was indeed a remarkable triumph for twoAustralians new to inter­ national cricket. The stand of R. A. Duff and W. W. Armstrong was really the feature of a game full of incidents. To say that it practically turned the game in favour of Australia is only to do the two youngsters fair justice. They put on 120 runs for the last wicket, and Duff had the distinction of creating a record as the only instance of a batsman making the highest score in each innings in a first test match. His score of 104 was the more noteworthy of the two, if only on account of the length of the innings. Still, Armstrong’s 46 not out was in no way inferior, and his coolness and nerve at a very critical time were worthy of the best traditions of Australian cricket. In the following test match the same qualities were again conspicuous. The Australians had lost five of their best wickets for 148 against a total of 317 by the English. OnceagainDuffand Armstrong withstood the English bowlers for a long time with all the resource of the veterans, putting on 71 runs during their partnership. With the one exception of Noble’s 56, Armstrong’s 55 was the highest score on the side, and taking into account the circumstances, it was an innings of very great merit. His highest innings of the season meanwhile, had been his 137 for W. W. ABM8TBONG. (Reproduced by permission o f “ The Tatler?