Cricket 1903

O ct . 2 9 , 1 9 0 3 . CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. 4 41 A l l readers of “ Gossip” will be grieved to hear of the unfortunate acci­ dent which has happened to Mr. C. W. Wright, one of the most popular cricketers that ever lived. He was shooting near Nottingham on October 17th, and a pellet, which is said to have rebounded from a trunk of a tree, struck him in the right eye, with very serious results. T h e dates of the following important matches for 1904 have already been fixed: Oxford v. Cambridge, Thursday, June 30, and following days; Gentlemen v. Players, at Lord’ s, July 4, etc.; and Eton v. Harrow, July 8 and 9. The season at Lord’s will begin on Wednes­ day, May 4—the date of the Marylebone annual meeting and dinner—with a match against Notts. Kugby v. Marl­ borough and Haileybury v. Cheltenham will take place as usual at Lord’s in the week preceding the August Bank Holiday. The annual meeting of county secretaries will be held at Lord’s, on Tuesday, December 8. I n the same w e ek , on the Monday, the captains of first - class counties will meet at Lord’s to select umpires for next season, while on the Wednesday the captains of the minor counties will meet for a similar purpose. Previous to the meeting on the Tuesday of the secretaries the annual meeting of the minor counties will be held. JtrsT before the Kent team reached America, J. B. King, the well-known fast bowler, injured his hand in a very peculiar manner. While in the act of making a run one of the fingers of his left hand caught against the bowler’s pocket and was broken. He was, how­ ever, able to play for All Philadelphia against Kent. F ok the benefit of future cricket his­ torians it may perhaps be as well to point out that on Wednesday, October 21st, the rain record from January 1st passed the previous record for a complete year. The figures are as follows :— Previous wettest year, 1879 ........................ 31*99 ins. Becord wettest year, to 6p.m. Oct. 21, 1903, 32 21 ins. A CRICKET team left Hongkong for Shanghai on September 23rd to play a few matches there. These are known as the “ interport matches.” W it h the finish of the return match between the Europeans of the Presidency and the Parsis at Poona, says the Bombay Gazette: “ All interest in the cricket season has died out. The season from a European point of view has been the worst experienced for years : for not only have the teams placed in the field by the Bombay and Poona Gymkhanas, the two principal clubs in the Presidency, met with poor success, but the Presidency team lost both matches against the Parsis. Between the close of last season and the beginning of the season under review the Presidency, from various causes, lost the services of several men who in the past have formed the backbone of European representative teams, and, among the new men with none to replace adequately such players as Greig, Wood, Sprott, Douglas, and Deas, it is hardly to be wondered that the season was a poor one for the European clubs.” PoONA, which is a favourite hunting- ground for makers of hundreds, had the unusual experience this year of not re­ turning a single score of three figures from a European batsman, though three natives, Telang, Narsoo, and Daruwalla, accomplished the feat. A cc o r d in g to the Ceylon Independent, Mr. P. F. Warner, previous to the depar­ ture of the M.C.C. team, wrote to the honorary secretary of the Ceylon C.C. with a view to arranging a match with the Island. Our contemporary states that great dissatisfaction was felt on the Island because it was proposed to include only Europeans on the Ceylon side. We do not know yet whether the match took place. A w r it e s in the Weekly Free Press, Winnipeg, relates the following story as told to him by a county cricketer of former days .•— A good but poor cricketer—not “ poor ” in the cricket field, hut in the linings of his pocket, received as a testimonial from his county a solid silver dish of great weight and massive proportions. He told the writer that it was the curse of his existence. He had continually to be purchasing haunches of mutton or venison, and invite to dinner some of the subscribers. The cold meat that was lefu over at the conclusion of the feast led him to be fed on hash for weeks (so he said). Then the weight of the enormous dish with the additional weight of the haunch could not be borne by an ordinary hired waiter. “ We were all sitting round the table, await­ ing the venison,” he said, “ when a fearful crash came from the hall. I jumped up, opened the door, and there lay the green­ grocer—who did waiting at night for a few of us—with his head imbedded in the meat, and the big silver monstrosity jet jangling where he had dropped it on the floor. I wish that dish had been given to the ‘ poor,’ it made a 1poor’ man of me.” No fewer than three of tbe six matches arranged by Cornwall last season were abandoned. At the annual meeting at Truro it was decided that the county club should be continued, and that a suggestion should be made to the com­ mittee of the Minor Counties competition that entrance to this competition should be made easier. O n Friday last E. G. Hayes, the Surrey cricketer, left Liverpool Street for Har­ wich and Antwerp on the way to South Africa. O n account of the heavy loss sustained on last season’s matches of the Essex County C.C., the committee have sum­ moned a special general meeting for Tuesday, November 10th, at 4 p.m., at the Great Eastern Hotel, Liverpool Street, E.C. The circular which has been sent to the members states that: “ The committee find it necessary, in view of the financial position of the club, to consult the members as to its future. Owing to the disastrous weather cf last summer, and the serious falling-off in the membership of the club, the committee are confronted with a deficit on the year of at least £1,500. The bad weather, it may be hoped, will not recur next year, but the steady decline of support of county cricket is such a serious matter that the committee feel bound to call a special general meeting in order that the position of the club may be placed before the members." W a l t e r M e a d , the famous Essex bowler, recently asked theEssex committee for an increase of pay during the winter, but the committee, mindful of the heavy losses incurred during the past season, did not see how this could be done. Mead thereupon advertised for a position as coac'i. He had hitherto been receiv­ ing twenty-five shillings a week during the winter, with no duties. T h e following extract from the account of a native match in India appears in the Fireside :— “ Never shall I forget the sight I saw during the next few minutes. We had told the crowd that it was their duty to cheer when our men went in, and as Abdullah marched to his post the enthusiasmwas great. At first he strongly objected to the wicket­ keeper standing so close to the stumps, and politely said that he wasn’t sure that he had room to hit—if the Sahib wouldn’t mind moving. At last he was convinced that the Sahib was part of the game and must be allowed to stay where he was. So comical was Abdullah’s appearance that the first ball went wide. Before the next could be delivered Abdullah’s hair required attending to, and, much to the amusement of everyone, he pro­ ceeded to effect his toilet operations on the spot. After this short delay the game was continued, and, strange to relate, Abdullah hit the ball—tipped it perhaps I should say. 1Run ! ’ we shouted, and run he did, as if a tiger had been after him. Unhappily he met Rallab half-way, and they embraced and fell at one another’s feet—of course, unintention­ ally. In the ordinary course of events three runs at least would have been scored, but by the time both men had recovered there was barely time for them to get back to their creases. As it was, Rallab was nearly run out, but our native umpire decided that his brother was undoubtedly not out.’ T h e election for this year’ s committee of the Melbourne C.C., held at the beginning of last month, found three Victorian cricketers, all of them well- known on English grounds, at the head of the poll. Hughie Trumble was an easy first with 1,105 votes, 47 ahead of W. Bruce, who was 233 in front of R. W. McLeod. Among the other four elected was F . Allan whom I take to be “ the bowler of a century,” who came over with the first team in 1878. A. E. Johns, the second wicket-keeper of 1899, was eighth on the list, the first of the non­ elect. The seven chosen were H. Trumble,