Cricket 1912

118 CEICKET : A WEEKLY EECOED OF THE GAME. M a t 11, 1912. A Chat about /Vir. Franl< /Mitchell. A certain freshman of Caius College, Cambridge, was undoubtedly the most talked-of man in cricket circles during the early part of the 1894 season. He had come up at a rather more mature age than the average undergraduate, some three or four years having elapsed since he left school. Beyond doubt he was a more finished batsman than a first-year man at either ’Varsity usually is. Standing very erect at the crease, he put much power into his strokes, and there was about him an aspect of command that partly accounted for the fulsomeness of the praise lavished upon him, perhaps. For fulsome it was. I am sure that no one realised the fact more fully than its object did. I am sure that Frank Mitchell did not want to be interviewed as to the right way to play Lockwood and Richardson, then at the height of their fame. I am sure that he did not think himself destined to eclipse the glories of W.G. The superlatives wrought him no good. When he failed, people were unduly disappointed- When he did well, it was only what everybody had been led to expect. One can recall other instances in which too high an original estimate of a man’s powers proved harmful to the man, leading too much to be expected of him. Cordingley’s is one—- labelled another Rhodes, and unable to live up to the standard. M clvor Jackson’s is another — the left-hander Surrey had been seeking, said some ultra-enthusiastic ipressmen. He wasn’t ! But he might possibly have had more chances if he had not been too loudly heralded. Frank Mitchell was bom at Market Weighton, York­ shire, on August 13th, 1872, and went to St. Peter’s School, York, whose only other famous cricket product has been the Rev. H. M. Sims, of the Cambridge elevens of 1873-5. Mitchell was captain of the school team in at least two seasons, and, though he went in also for rowing, made a lot of runs, including a century against the Yorkshire Gentlemen in 1889. Leaving school, he spent some time in Sussex, and played a good deal o f cricket for the Brighton •C.C., among his scores for the club being 102 not out -v. South Saxons in 1891, and 184 v. Hurstpierpoint College and 123* v. Littlehampton in 1893. He had thus had a fairly lengthy experience of first-class club cricket when he went up to Cambridge, and naturally found much of the College bowling he ran up against pretty soft stuff. In the course of a week at the end of April and begin­ ning of May, 1894, he made for Caius 143 v. Emmanuel, 203* v. Peterhouse, and 136 v. Selwyn, setting tongues wagging freely. In the Freshmen’s match he scored 32 in each innings. He began his first-class career with 67 v. Mr. C. I. Thornton’s X I., the highest score of the game, and a particularly well-played innings. I saw i t ; I have seen Mitchell play a fair number of times since, have noted the change in his batting methods which made for increased defensive powers without loss of aggression ; and I have always ranked him, like H. K . Foster and J . R. Mason, as among the men who ought to have played for England. But his first Test match will be played for South Africa, and at the age of 39 ! Perhaps the best batting he ever showed at Fenner’s was seen in the Yorkshire match of 1894. In first and out ninth in the first innings, he batted 170 minutes for 75. N o one else reached 20. In the second, w ith bettor support, he scored a chanceless 92 in two hours. Altogether he did good work for Cambridge in that season, figuring as a slow bowler with success against Surrey at the Oval and in the ‘Varsity match ; but he achieved nothing in the three matches in which he played for Yorkshire. In 1895 he played in 11 matches for the University and 9 for Yorkshire, made a splendid 191 v. Somerset at Fenner’s, showing some of the most powerful off-driving ever seen on the ground, a hard-hit 155 (including twenty-three 4’s) v. Liverpool and District— this score, however, not being included in his first-class aggregate— and averaged 27*69 on a total of over 900. In the autumn he captained a team of ’Varsity men in America. .. The next season found him leading Cambridge ; but, except for one game against the Australians at Eastbourne, he played no big cricket outside the Light Blue programme. His best scores of the season were 110 v. Sussex, at Hove, and 84 v. Mr. Webbe’s X I. at Cambridge. In 1897 his biggest innings for Cambridge was 66 v. Sussex ; but he made 133 and 58 for M.C.C. against the Gentlemen of Philadelphia, and 84 for Gentlemen v. Players at Hastings, when everyone else on the side except W.G. failed. His ’Varsity career had now ended, and the general impression left by it was one of disappointment. He had done well, but then most people had expected him to do more than well. In 1898 he played but little first-class crick et; but he was strikingly successful in that little, running up 161 in 200 minutes for M.C.C. v. Cambridge at Lord’s, where he and C. W. Wright sent up 208 before a w icket fell, and scoring two 35’s, highest score in each innings on a bad wicket, for Mr. Webbe’s X I. v. Oxford. In the autumn he went with Warner’s team to America, and headed the batting averages, making 128 v. Ontario at Toronto and 66 v. New York at Staten Island. A few weeks later he boarded ship again— for South Africa, with Lord Hawke, this time, The form he showed on this tour was so good as to bring: him an invitation to represent Yorkshire regularly in 1899. His 81 v. Cape Colony was a long way the highest innings of the game ; he played magnificently for 162 v. the Transvaal, when John Tyidesley and Albert Trott also scored centuries ; he made 82 v. XV . of Griqualand West at Kimberley ; his aggregate of 857 was the highest for the side, and his average only a trifle over two runs per innings below that of Warner, who stood first. It was in 1899 that he really came into his own. He made more runs than any other man for Yorkshire, and he made them in masterly form. After a level century v. Gloucestershire at Bristol in the middle of May he had rather a bad spell, broken only by 68 (top score of the innings) v. Middlesex at Lord’s ; but a month later he played a great innings of 194 v. Leicestershire at Leicester, Wainwright helping him to put on 329 runs for the fifth wicket, and after that he never looked back. In chrono­ logical order his chief scores were 77 v. Leicestershire at Sheffield, 121 v. Middlesex at Bradford, 67 v. Kent at Leeds, 85 v. Notts, at Bradford, 84 v. Lancashire at Manchester, 87 v. Surrey at the Oval, and 55 v. Kent at Tonbridge. Then South Africa claimed him again— for fields of war this time— and 1900 was a blank cricket year for him. He came back to the White Rose team in 1901, and played even greater cricket than in 1899. Then Jackson and Hirst had shared the honours with him ; now he stood out alone—the finest batsman of a team of fine batsmen, with an average practically 50 per cent, higher than the next man’s. In the first four or five matches he did little ; but he began a long run of success with 78 v. Derbyshire at Huddersfield, ran up 87 on the old familiar Fenner’s ground in the next match, scored a faultless 100 v. Hants, at Bournemouth ten days later, another chanceless century v. Middlesex at Lords in the succeeding game, then 106* v. Surrey at Bradford, and a magnificent 162* v. Warwickshire at Edgbaston—four centuries in four successive matches within a fortn igh t! Before the end of the season came for him—early, because he left for a third American tour—he had registered three more centuries and five more scores of between 50 and 100: in order, 52 v. Essex at Leyton, 86 v. Derbyshire at Glossop, 122 v. Leicestershire at Scarborough, 57 v. Worcestershire at Worcester, 116* v. Warwickshire at Bradford, 106 and 54 v. Lancashire at Leeds, and 50 v. Middlesex at Sheffield. . It was now, at the height o£ his form, that he left England for South Africa, as private secretary to Sir (then Mr.) Abe Bailey. On a brief visit to the old country in 1902 he played in one big game, and scored 29 and 55 not out for M.C.C. v. the Australians. Representing the Transvaal in the Currie Cup Tourna­ ment at Port Elizabeth in 1902-3, he made 102 v. Griqua­ land West, and 72 and 60 v. the Border—in each case being highest scorer of the innings. In 1903-4, when the