Cricket 1903

Nov. 26, 1903. CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. 457 heartily together, both at the wickets and in the field. “ Their batting ia consistent and solid rather than enterprising, and there is an absence of a pronounced ‘ tail, ’ a point which will be found greatly in their favour in matches spread over four or five days. The fielding is very keen and smart, and Warner shows considerable judgment in placing his men. “ Regarding the bowling, however, judg­ ments vary. The balance of opinion inclines to the view that the attack lacks ‘ devil,’ and that it will not be very terrible on the plumb wickets out here. Hirst so far has displayed a tendency to be too short to be very deadly, and although Rhodes keeps a good length he is plain. “ Arnold comes quickly from the pitch, but, like the others, he gets very little work on. Braund is ‘ heady,’ as usual, and will get a lot of wickets. ‘ ‘ To sum up, those Australian cricketers who have seen the English bowling are very hopeful of winning the ‘ rubber ’ in the test matches, where, in my opinion, the scoring will probably be very heavy.” I n a letter to a friend, Dr. Macdonald, the Queensland and Leicestershire cricketer, says :— We have in Queensland a black fellow (true aboriginal) who is quite the fastest bowler in the world, and I should not be surprised to see him in the test matches. His pace is terrific. Somelocal cricketers contend that his hand should be whitewashed. When he hits the wicket he jumps about six feet in the air. If the wicket is good the English­ men will, of course, score off him, but if he catches them on a broken wicket I reckon that when the next census returns are made up some will be missing, and next year’s “ Wisden” will contain some notable obitu­ ary notices. W it h regard to the declaration of his innings by P. P. Warner at Adelaide, P. A. Iredale cabled to the Daily Mail as follows:— The consensus of opinion here is that the laws of cricket will not permit of a declara­ tion on the second day of a four days’ match (which the present encounter is). Mr. Warner contends that under the circumstances the two captains could agree on thepoint—which they apparently did—but Australian critics argue that the request for permission to declare was rather unexpected, coming as it did from the representative of cricket’s law­ makers. Mr. Hill was careful to say, how­ ever, that his acquiescence in the present case did not establish a precedent for future matches. I t was not easy to form an opinion from the various reports of correspondents as to the state of the wicket on the first day of the match against Victoria at Melbourne. But reading between the lines it was pretty evident that the wicket must have been slow and in favour of the bowlers when the game began. Thus:— “ The wicket appeared to be in good condi­ tion when Laver decided to go in.” “ The outfield was very sodden from the heavy rains.” “ The wicket (at the end of the first day) was playing well at the finish.” “ The wicket (end of first day) is increasing in pace.” T he representatives of the various branches of sport at Oxford University have conferred ard decided to invite Cambridge to adopt a rule that all repre­ sentatives of Oxford and Cambridge shall only be qualified within four years of matriculation, and that any qualified person who shall be non-resident during that period can only qualify b y residing six weeks in the term during which he will be required to compete. The Oxford cricket, athlelic and football clubs ap­ prove of the suggestion, but the boat club will not give a decision until they have b?en able to confer more fully with Cambridge. J. H okan, who batted so well against the M.C.C. team for Yictoria, is a son of Tom Horan, who came to England with the first Australian team in 1878 as well as the team of 1882, and is now well known as “ Felix ” of the Australasian. The critics prophesy great things for his son as a batsman. A s a result of the wet season the match expenses of Middlesex, the cham­ pion county, exceeded the receipts by £19 4s. 7d. last year, but as the county has about £4,500 invested in Consols this does not greatly matter. The follow ing is a list of the expenses and receipts in the various matches :— Receipts. Expenses. £ s. d. £ s. d. v. Gloucestershire (home...160 6 6 ... 54 9 3 v. Gloucestershire (away) ... ----- ... 68 5 0 v. Yorkshire (home) ................343 110 ... 84 9 3 v. Yorkshire (away) ............... ...... ... f3 0 1 v. Notts (home) ....................... 12 160 ... 61 12 9 v. Notts (away) ................... ...... ... 62 5 1 v. Essex (home) (no play) .. ... ----- ... 41 18 9 v. Essex (away) ................... ...... ... 28 17 9 v. Somerset (home) t ............... ...... ... ----- v. Somerset (away) ............. ...... ... 71 8 6 v. Surrey (home) . ................ S31130 ...107 4 3 v. Surrey (away................... ..... . ... 40 0 0 v. Lancashire (home) ......... 66 126 ... 62 16 9 v. Lancashire (away)............. ...... ... 73 6 2 v. Sussex (home) ................ 13019 6 ... 62 0 9 v. Sussex (away).................. ...... ... 65 16 0 v. Kent (home) (no play)....... ...... ... 4^ 6 9 v. Kent (away) ........ ........ ...... ...5110 0 2nd XI. v. Essex 2nd(home) ... 3 12 0 ... 11 4 0 2nd X I. v. Essex 2nd (away) ... ----- ... 17 1 0 2nd XI. v. Sussex 2nd (away) .. ----- ... £2 4 0 Totals ........ 1,048 8 6 1,067 13 1 Debit balance ........ £19 4s. 7d. +Proceeds given to W. Attewell’s benefit. A tter another bad season, Worcester­ shire has now a deficit of £2,694, although the annual report shows that the number of members has increased. The actual deficit for the past year was £607, as compared with £784 in the previous year and £861 in 1901. Great efforts are to be made to put the county on a better footing. W hile hunting with the South Ches­ hire hounds on November 17th, A . H . Hornby, the Lancashire cricketer and son of A. N. Hornby, met with an accident which resulted in a broken rib. His horse put its foot into a rabbit hole and rolled over. A t the annual general meeting of the Middlesex County last week, it was resolved that a very hearty vote of thanks be accorded to Messrs. Gregor Macgregor and P. F. Warner for their captaincy in a season which had seen tbe county placed in the proud position of being champions. Donations were, as usual, given to the various professionals, and it was resolved to mark the success of the tide by presenting to each cricketer who had represented the county in five or more matches a memento of winning the championship in the shape of a gold medallion. A hearty vote of thanks was given to Mr. V. K. Walker, who has for so many years taken such an active interest in the doings of the county club. T h e actual profit on the season’s Yorkshire matches was £270 18s. 6d., but the figures are more favourable than this net profit suggests. A sum of £292 was spent on alterations to the members’ pavilions at Leeds, Bradford and Shef­ field, £210 was paid for the testimonial voted to Mr. J. B. Wostinholm, £136 grants to injured players, etc., and the tax of £268 11s. 2d. upon the county funds, consequent on the payment of 15 per cent, on Tunnicliffe’s benefit receipts to the Bradford club. Thus it will be seen that the county made a clear profit of over £1,000 in a season that was most unfavourable. A t the annual general meeting of the Hampshire County C.C. which will take place on Friday next, November 27th, the report will show an adverse balance owing to the bad weather during the past season. The appointment of the paid secretary, Mr. P. H. Bacon, has answered expectations, and the amount of his stipend has been earned by in­ creased subscriptions, and by the profit on the catering which he was able to manage for the benefit of the club. Llewellyn has been engaged for a period of five years, and Webb is to have a benefit next season. O n another page will be found the proposed scheme for a reclassification of counties, suggested by the Minor Counties’ Cricket Association. Whatever may be the merits of the scheme, it is quite clear that it cannot be adopted, for it would be absurd to suppose that the first-class counties would agree to any scheme which would place some of them in a second-class at once and others in a year or two. Moreover, on the face of it the idea of placing (for example) York­ shire, which plays every other first-clafs county, on a level with some minor counties which only play three or four other minor counties, is preposterous. At the same time, everyone sympathises with the minor counties in their diffi­ culties. T h e following graceful tribute to Lord Hawke’s Team which visited Melbourne last season appeared in the