Cricket 1909

M ay 27, 1909. CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. r47 The construction of the Demon Drivers is fully described in The Evolution of a Cricket Bat , which may be obtained free upon applica­ tion. im m i ll»UmV£P MAKE KEEPTHEIRSHAPE-LAS.' LONCEgE C A T A L O G U E U P O N A P P L IC A T IO N . C A T A L O Q U E U P O N A P P L IC A T IO N . C A T A L O G U E U P O N A P P L IC A T IO N . IB El r n C A T A L O G U E U P O N A P P L IC A T IO N . B U S S E Y S ^DEMON DRIVERS 8 ' e ARE OUT AND OUT THE BEST. rGRADES 7'-C,'-S'- 4'<tW-3'e-3'-2\s-Z'- C A T A L O G U E U P O N A P P L IC A T IO N T O GEO. G. BUSSEY Sc Co.. Ltd .. 36 & 38, Queen Victoria St., LONDON. Manufactory — Timber Mills — PECKHAM, S.E. ELMSWELL, SUFFOLK, Agents all over the world. AT THE SIGN OF THE WICKET. By F. S. A s h le y -C o o p e r. The Australians must have been very dis­ appointed with the result of their visit to London last week, especially as the two defeats they experienced came immediately after their satisfactory doings at Trent Bridge and Northampton and their wonderful scor­ ing a,t Leyton. They would in all probability have pulled off the Surrey match had they shown a little enterprise in the final stage of the game, whilst their defeat at Lord's was due as much to the two catches dropped byWhitty as to disappointing batting. Still, their reverse at the hands of the M.C.C. was no disgrace. They lacked the services of Cotter, who would have been well suited by the wicket, and it was a very powerful team indeed which was played against them. Whether much importance should be attach­ ed to the fact that as many as eight of the Australians were making their first appear­ ance at head quarters is a moot point. In the old days, when great matches were far fewer than is the case now, a cricketer always regarded his first match at Lord’s as one of the most important events in his career. Such sentiment, however, is now quite a thing of the past so far as Englishmen are concerned, although it is easy to believe that every young Australian player of promise looks forward to the day when he will appear for his country on that historic ground. Those who were fortunate enough to be present at Lord’s during the last three days of the past week saw a match which was full of interest and incident from start to finish. Runs always took a lot of getting, and the visitors were given conclusive evidence of the fact that strokes which gather in hundreds of runs on plumb wickets are very risky when employed on defective pitches : the newcomers, having become so used to batting under ideal con­ ditions, found themselves unable to adapt themselves to different circumstances, and some loss of reputation was the natural result. The lesson which Australians should learn from their recent experience is that the hard, true wickets of their native land are an unmixed blessing. Perfect pitches are disheartening to bowlers and the cause of a large proportion of drawn games. Why in some places everything should be made as easy as possible for the batsman has always been a mystery to those who love tbe game best for true cricket is seen only when bat and ball are on an equality. One other point arising out of the Lord’s match may be alluded to briefly, and it is suggested by the important bearing the cricket of Tarrant had upon the result. At the risk of being considered hypercritical, I would propose that, when the return match is played, the team which is put into the field by the M.C.C. should tot contain the player named. He was imported from Aus­ tralia on account of his skill as a cricketer, and the desirability of pitting him against his own countrymen in a representative match is certainly open to criticism, apart altogether from the fact that his selection means the exclusion from the side of an English-born player. The membership of the M.C.C. is well over five thousand and the staff engaged by the Club is a large one, so no difficulty should ever be experienced in getting a really powerful side together. The Australians have no right to expect the M.C.C. to act iu tbe manner suggested, but, if the Club did so, they would be the first to appreciate the courtesy. At the present time Hobbs is in wonderful form with the bat, and those who have seen him play some of his large innings during the past few weeks have been very fortunate, for he invariably makes his runs by graceful methods. At Edgbaston last week he made two separate hundreds in a first-class match for the first time, and by getting out for 99 at the Oval on Monday only just missed obtaining three in succession. His perform­ ance at the expense of Warwickshire recalls the fact that three years ago he made 116 and 105 not out in a one-day match at Luton. Particulars were not published at the time and, so far as I am aware, the score of the match did not appear in the newspapers. The present will, therefore, be an appropriate occasion for giving the details :— Played at Wardown, Luton, on June 25, 1006. S outh K ensington . First innings. Second innings. J. B. Hobbs, c H oybD ow ll6 n otou t..................105 Walmhurst, c and b Dow... 12 Barkley, b Cripps ...........15 D. White, c Cripps, b Brown 8 Williams, run out ........... 1 G. Nixey, b Cripps .......... 14 H. Collins, c Brown, b Dow 6 A. Jefferies, b Cripps........... 3 H. C. Owen, c Warren, b Cripps.................................. 4 D. Woolren, b Dow ...........19 not o u t ................... 43 M. Davis, not out ........... 4 Byes, &c...................... 8 Byes, &c. ... 11 Total .......... 210 L uton . Total (0 wkt)159 G. H. Small, stOwen, b Walmhurst.......... 22 W. Samms, run out... Graves Morris,cWalm­ hurst, b Hobbs F. Small, not out F. Cripps, st Owen, b Walmhurst ......... . Bves, &c.............. Total ..120 F. Hoy, b Hobbs J. Dow, b Walmhurst H. Holdstock,bWalm- hurst.......................... G. Claridge, run out... W. Brown, lbw, b Walmhurst H. Warren, b Walm­ hurst......................... Hobbs hit eighteen 4’s in his first innings and twenty-one in his second. South Ken­ sington scored 159 without loss of a wicket in 45 minutes, Hobb3 makiug 44 runs off three overs. The team selected to do duty for England in the match which commences at Edgbaston to-day created no surprise, but it is nevertheless somewhat remnrkab’e that, with one exception, all the players have passed their thirtieth year. The late Arthur Shrewsbury declartd that a cricketer was at his best at the age of thirty-five In the cace of a batsman who is rarely, if ever, called upon to bowl, and who generally fields near the wicket it may be so, but it stands to reason lhat a team whose average age is thirty-five years would not be so active in the field as one of seven or eight years less. A match at Lord’s between Over Thirty and Under Thirty would prove a great attraction if representative sides could be got together. Strudwick, George Gunn, Hardstaff, J. N. Crawford, J. W. H. T. Douglas, Hobbs, A. P. Day, Woolley, K. L. Hutchings and Dennett woul 1 all be qualified to assist the latter, and would form the nucleus of a really pood team. It mav prove of interest t >recall that when the Old played the Young at L^r .’s in 1810 the limit of age for the latter was as high as thirty-eight. ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. K.S. (Abingdon).—Many thanks, but we are not publishing the summaries this year. Bishop played a not out innings of 205 for San­ atorium v. St. Mary’s Hospital at Virginia Water on Saturday.