Cricket 1908

33 * CR ICK ET A- W EEKLY RECORD OF THfe GAME. A u g u s t 6, 190&. L ast week the R ev. H enry Foster, father of the fam ous W orcestershire brotherhood, w as presented with a testim onial from Old M alvernians on his retirement from the house-m astership o f “ N o. 5 ,” which he held for thirty-seven years. O ver £ 5 0 0 w as subscribed, and a cheque for the am ount was handed to M r. Foster, who suitably acknow ledged the kindly feeling which had prom pted the testim oinal. H is seven sons, with their ages, are :— H . K . ( 34 ), Capt. W . L . (33), R . E. (30), B . S. (26), G . N . (23), M . K . (19), and N . J. A. (17). T h e last-named is still at Malvern C ollege. U nited Services accom plished a go od run- ge ttin g perform ance at Portsm outh on Saturday at the expense o f Incogniti. Set 305 to win in three hours, they m ade the runs with twenty m inutes to spare for the loss o f five w ickets, Captain J. S. B ostock (116) and Comm ander H . D . R . W atson (92) putting up 171 for the first w icket. T h e highest o f the three previous innings had been only 247. It has been conjectured in some quarters w hy C . B. Fry has not found it convenient to play for Sussex at Canterbury this week, and I trust I am d oin g him no injustice when I suggest that it m ay be ow in g to the action of a section of the crow d in the corresponding m atch o f last year in ironi­ cally cheering him whenever he fielded a ball during a portion o f the first innings of K ent. If this is so, it .may be doubted whether he acted in the best interests of S ussex cricket in tak in g the m atter so m uch to heart and handicapping his side to such an extent. R eference to W isd en , by- the-w ay, show s that C .B .F . has not played in Gloucestershire since 1904 nor at N ottingham since 1905. Lieut. A. W . Lupton, w ho has appeared on a few occasions for Y orkshire, w as on Saturday gazetted as a Captain-Adjutant in the Territorial F orce, and will do duty w ith the 8th B attalion Prince of W a les’ O w n W est Y orkshire R egim ent. H e is son o f a form er M ayor o f B radford and comm enced his career as a V olunteer, pass­ in g into the line w hile on active service in South A frica. T here was som e brisk scoring on Satur­ day last in the D urham County Senior L ea gu e match at H endon between E ffle - ton and H endon, 519 runs being m ade in five minutes under the five hours allowed for play, inclusive o f all stoppages. Epple- ton, havin g made 255 for eight w ickets, declared their innings closed, leaving H en­ don 130 minutes in w hich to bat. In that tim e the hom e side ran up 264, Denis H endren, who hit twenty-one 4 ’s, m akin g 109 in fifty m inutes. I hear that L lew ellyn’s benefit was guaranteed by the H am pshire County C .C . Comm ittee, so that the ga te receipts were not an all-im portant consideration. T he latter, by-the-w ay, totalled only £ 1 7 0 9s. 9d. for the three days. At the end of the first afternoon it appeared as though H am pshire would give their opponents a go od gam e, but m issed catches subsequent­ ly played an important part, and K ent, obtaining 125 in their second innings in great style, w on by nine wickets. H enry G eorge Sm oker, who played oc* casionally for H am pshire a few years a go, has been enjoying a successful season in Cheshire. T o date, in addition to scoring 790 runs, he has obtained 107 w ickets for the N ew B righton C .C . at an average cost of eight runs. In September he marries M iss D orothy N orbury, o f Bartley C ross, N ew Forest. It is unlikely that H argreave will be seen in the W arw ickshire team again this sea­ son. W hen playing against Surrey at the O val he severely twisted his knee whilst fielding a ball, and it is upon the advice o f Sir Thom as Chevasse that he has de­ cided not to play any m ore this year. Last season he took seventy w ickets in County Cham pionship m atches alone, so his ab­ sence is bound to handicap the side con­ siderably. F rom T h e O b s e r v e r :— K ent has “ succeeded excellently well ” in its cricket, and it w ill take the field to-m orrow with a gloriou s record. There are alw ays fresh as well as old faces to be found in Canterbury for the W eek, though one would w illingly break a lance w ith the author w hose soliloquy for T hom as & B eckett’s gh ost in one o f the old epilogues ran som ething C raig-like, thus :—• The only pilgrims who now pass my wickets Are those who come with Cook's cheap tourist tlCKGtS, Wh(iu n o £ -di8traoted’ ’twixt my shrine and If I ’m the a Beckett who once wrote in Punch. Canterbury, as a rule, sets aflam e the rh ym esters; the inspiring summons seems infective here— “ Let those rhym e now who never rhymed before, And those w h o al­ w ays rhym e, rhym e now the m ore.” In their match against the Gentlemen of Ireland, which comm ences at Dublin to- day, Yorkshire will be captained by a player new to county cricket in the person of Sir Archibald W oollaston W hite, B art., w ho has recently been scoring well for the Y orksh ire Gentlem en— on Saturday he w ound up a successful w eek ’s cricket by m ak in g 108 against Free Foresters. Sir A rchibald, who is a first-rate field, was born on O ctober n t h , *877. “ T h e English public need not w orry them selves over the thought that Phila­ delphia would wish to enter a four-cornered contest with E ngland, Australia and South A frica ,” says The Am erican C ricketer. “ C ricket in Philadelphia is played because the men takin g part in it love it for itself, and not because the public dem ands rt. Periodical visits are paid to E ngland and team s are invited to visit Philadelphia prim arily to increase the interest in the gam e on this side and to im prove the standard of the play. Philadelphia cricketers know their lim itations, but they are proud o f the fact that they can send a team abroad capable o f playing the English counties with an even chance of success.” A t the time o f the third test match played in Adelaide last January A. Cotter, the fast bow ler of N ew South W ales, after arrival, found that he could not play ow in g to an injury received in a M elbourne m atch a few days previously. An applica­ tion, as announced in Gossip a fortnigh t a go, was made to the N ew South W ales A ssociation for remuneration to Cotter, who w as deprived of his fee for the m atch, but it was refused. T h e South Australian C ricket Association has decided to pay C otter £ 2 5 , the am ount he would have received had he taken part in the gam e. E . Dancer, for W hitcom b W anderers v. N om ads, at A cton, on the 2nd inst., took five wickets with consecutive balls, the first tw o clean bow led, the third l.b .w ., and the last tw o again bow led down. T h e feat was perform ed on a perfect w icket. In the course of his not out innings of 46 for Y orkshire against Lancashire at Manchester on Saturday, H irst, for the sixth season in succession and the ninth during his career, com pleted the feat of takin g a hundred wickets and scorin g a thousand runs in first-class matches. T w o prolific partnerships for the first w icket in M etropolitan club cricket have to be recorded. On July 27th Dr. A . R . H obbs (165), form erly of St. M a ry’s, and his brother, E. C. H obbs (133), m ade 297 together tor Shepherd’s Bush against L on ­ don County on the ground of the form er. T his perform ance, good though it was, was surpassed at East D ulw ich on Satur­ day last by W . A. M itchell (160 not out) and J. Faulkner (143 not out), w ho made 311 runs without loss in a couple o f hours for Brixton W anderers 2nd X I. v. Croydon 2nd X I . Only three chances were given, and all after 200 had been made. A t the Oval on M onday afternoon a col­ lection made round the ground for H ayes, whose benefit m atch last m onth w as aban*-