Cricket 1907

CRICKET i A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. OC T. 31, 1907. “ Together joined in Cricket’s manly toil.” — Byron. No. 767. VOL. XXVI. THURSDAY, OCTOBEE 31, 1907. PRICE 2d V u s l r a l r a n ©earn 1907-8 Barne Har.datatf AUSTRALIAN CRICKETERS OF TO-DAY. THE MEN THE M.C.C. W ILL MEET. B y J. N. P e n t e lo w . The eighteenth visit of an English team to Australia (some writers make it the seven­ teenth, not allowing a “ progressive number ” to Lord Hawke’s teamto New Zealand, which visited the Commonwealth at the end of the season 1902-3; but this confused system does not appeal to me) marks an epoch in these tours. For the first time the matches are practically confined to eleven-a-side games, the only occasion on which odds are likely to be seen in the field being the Boxing Day match at Bendigo. For the first time, too, matches will be played in every State. No previous team has played in Western Australia ; Tasmania was not visited between 1894-5 and 1903-4; and in 1901-2 there was no match in Queensland. The team will play four matches on the Sydney ground, two tests, two v. New South Wales. In Melbourne it will appear five times, twice in test matches and twice v. Victoria on the Melbourne C.C. ground, and v. A Victoria X I. (it would surely be better to call this match “ v. Victoria ” also) on the South Melbourne enclosure. There will be three matches at Adelaide—one test game, two v. South Australia; two at Brisbane in succession, the first v. Queensland, the second v. An Eleven of Australia; two at Perth (unless one be shifted to Fremantle) v. Western Australia ; and one each at Hobart and Launceston, in each case v. Tasmania. This programme is a notable advance on any previously arranged, and though Western Australia, Tasmania and Queensland have little chance of beating their visitors, they can all put really useful teams in the field and ought to give them good games.