Cricket 1910

194 CR ICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. J une i 6, 1910. the point, far more sporting cricket in county matches, and there would be no necessity for the adoption of the Lancashire scheme or any other scheme designed to make playing to win a compulsory virtue and the only way to achieve success in the competition. In so far, however, as the Lancashire scheme compels a side to play to win, because points can only be secured by winning, I am in favour of the scheme, and think that its merits far exceed such faults as it presents and the injustice to which it may give rise. There is no peifect scheme and, as I have said, any reasonable S 3 stem of reckoning would suffice, if the captains would only shake off the domina­ tion of the competitive idea and play the game in its proper spirit. I have seen so many county matches during the past decade in which the traditional spirit of the game was outraged by the domination of the com­ petitive idea that I would like to see the Championship, as a formal competition, abolished for one season. Please under­ stand, however, that I do not regard a definite result as essential to interest, to pood cricket or to playing the game as it should be played. I think that the cry for definite results perpetuates aud encourages a fallacy. There are many matches in which a draw is not only the most satisfactory, but also the beet possible or most just, result from a 4 sporting ’ point of view. It is all a question of circumstances. Therein, of course, lies the chief objection to the Lanca­ shire scheme of reckoning, which came into operation this season. At the same time, penal measures—and in some sort in the case of certain sides the new system has a distinctly punitive, if it fails to have a de­ terrent, character—were almost necessary. It is matter for regret, however, that there should have been any necessity to frame a scheme that enforced the assumption of a virtue—the virtue of playing to win and playing ‘ sporting ’ cricket. There is more­ over some danger of overburdening county cricket with more or less arbitrary rules or, if the term be preferred, laws. Most of the rules of cricket as a game are or seem more or less natural laws, and to force sides to play a certain game as the only means to com­ petitive success is a somewhat danperous ex­ periment from the technical point of view and gives additional emphasis to the contention that cricket, partly by reason of the nature of the game, partly byreason of the very different conditions, the chief being the state of the wicket and of the light, which may prevail during the course of any ‘ three day ’ match, is not suited to competitive purposes. The continuity of the Competition compels the judging of each performance of a side by an absolute standard, whereas the only just standard of judgment is relative.” “ Speaking as a journalist, do you think that modern criticism is both competent and fa ir?” “ Well that is a rather delicate, though not a difficult question to answer. I have no desire to criticise my fellow critics, but their views are always fair. This is specially true of the Metropolitan critic, for London jour­ nalism compels the broad and judicial view. Metropolitanism makes for cosmopolitanism in judgment. At the same time I think that only those who play or have played the game are qualified to write with that proper sympathy for tie men ‘ in the middle’ which is essent al alike for accuracy and justice. Speaking in the most general terms, there are two classes of critics who are irritating and apt to be unintentionally un­ just. One is the critic who knows the game, and is pedantically technical in what he writes, and the other is the critic who does not know the game, makes ludicrous techni­ cal errors and indulges in generalities and personalities. Those who hit the golden mean are. of course, the best, the most just and the most pleasing—I might add the most convincing —writers. We must not take all casual writers too seriously, men, that is, who wii'e as emergency men. It was one of this type who declared in an evening paper last season that ‘ Lees had developed a particularly deadly ‘ Yorker’ that shot’—a saying which may be ranked with that of another writer who informed his readers that a certain Australian bowler ‘ could bowl a ‘ Yorker ’ that got up quickly and in a very awkward fashion ’ ” “ What faults are most common in critics ? ” “ I presume you mean what are their most common descriptive or critical errors ? Well, two of the most common are the tendency to describe all balls that bowl good batsmen as exceptionallydifficult and excellent deliveries, whereas they may be merely good length balls or even lialf-volle.\s. The same ten­ dency is in evidence in describing most cases of ‘ caught and bowled.’ It is a trick of the trade to attribute the dismissal of a good batsman in this way to some cunning and skilful variation in pace by the bowler, whereas the return has been due to a hesita­ ting stroke - the half hit which is a mental product—or to mistiming a half-volley The man who plays knows this quite well, be­ cause he has made such strokes himself, but even he may be tempted, for journalistic purposes, to give the bowler more credit than is his due. It is so much more graphic and dramatic than the bald truth that the great batsman is human, qua cricketer, and was in two minds or make a mistake in timing his stroke. Another very common error is description of possible catches as chances. I am c’.early of opinion that only men who play or have played a lot of cricket are judges of what constitutes a real chance against the batsman. It is trite knowledge, so far as cricketers are concerned, that the easy-looking catch is often tbe most difficult and that the brilliant snap catch is often the easiest of all.” “ You yourself make a good number of these 4 brilliant ’ catches each season ? ” “ If you mean one-handed catches and so on at mid off, well ‘ yes,’ and I can, if I may venture to do so, Must* ate my meaning from my own experience. You get just as difficult catches in good club ciicket as in the highest variety of first-class cricket. Hence the analogy counts. Now there is one match in which I play each season and in which I always make a gallery catch of the ‘ flukey ’ kind under notice. This is the match between ‘ Holland’s Surrey XI. and XVI. of Mitcham and District.’ Last season’s catch was the most ‘ gallery ’ of ‘ gallery ’ catches. I was fielding rather wide at mid-on and Rushby was the bowler. The batsman made a tremendously hard, almost straight, drive which passed wide of Rushby’ s left hand. I ran from mid-on to behind the wicket on the off side and as I ran thought the ball was miles away from my left hand even if I got level with it in time. I threw out my left hand and to my surprise the ball stuck and the catch was made. The only merit in such a catch is that you got to the ball. Even that is pro­ vidential ; the making of the catch is purely accidental, yet it is the sort of catch on which the critic loves to exhaust his superla­ tives in praise. Let me cite other examples. A very hard catch to take is one that comes straight and fast at you and is rising. A throat-high catch of this kind comes straight to hand and would, therefore, probably be descr.bed as easy, especially if the press-box were behind the fieldsman, yet it is the most difficult of all catches except the gyrating ‘ skier,’ which remains so long in the air and performs so many twistings and turnings that it is probably the most difficult of all catches. Yet a chauce from such a skier is generally described as ‘ easy.’ Then there is t' e ball that a man just reaches by in­ telligent anticipation, pace and enterprise. This is called a chance because a fieldsman just reaches it to drop it. Catching is a lottery and, though it is more a matter of eye than of hand, any man, the notorious sinners in this respect excepted, may drop a catch, or three or four catches, which he would make ninety-nine times out of a hun- dred. I think that more unmerited praise is awarded to, and more undeserved blame is heaped on, players for making and dropping catches than in any other department of the game. The frame of mind counts for as much in catching as in batting, and when you feel you are going to make a catch, you make it and vice ver.<a, proviJed you have any time to think about the matter, and thought is so quick that 3 rou always have some time, but, of course, you have so much more in tbe case of a skier that the fact accounts, other reasons apart, for these catches being so often dropped.” ‘ •Do you find much difference between English and Scottish club cricket ? ” “ Well, English club cricket is of greater all-round excellence than the Scottish club cricket of my day, for I have not played in Sco.land since 1890. There were, of course, some very fine cricketers in Scotland, but the all-round standard, as was natural, was much lower than in England. The number of really fine cricketers in tbe metropolitan area alone is won lerfully large. Many of these would be in the first flight, if they played first-class cricket, for it is playing first-class cricket which makes the first-class cricketer, especially batsmen. I notice this in studying young professionals as they advance. Much, of course, depends upon the temperament, for there are many men of great physical powers cricketwise who lack the cricket temperament an I never succeed iu cultivating it. Though the system of training is often somewhat haphazard and the game can really only be mastered ‘ in the middle just look at the way in which H.rst and Rhodes made themselves into great batsmen-it is not difficult to tell the young player of parts who will succeed in first-class cricket, especi’al’y professionals. He takes the game seriously and is optimistic without being in any way conceited as to his powers. The royal road to s ipreme success is open only to the gifted—the very gifted few. The average good player, however great he may become-and some of the greatest batsmen have been *made ’ in this sense—must achieve greatness by toiling up­ hill, eliminating weaknesses and perfecting his strong points. I think that the chief def* ct in the coaching on most grounds is failure to specialise powers iu the sense just indicated. The individual pecularities of young players are not sufficiently studied. Possibly the number of pupils is too large, while they are not all so tractable as their own interests would lead one to expect.”