Cricket 1912

A u g u s t 17, 1912. CRICKET: A WEEKLY EECOED OF THE GAME. 419 Cricket: A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. 33 and 35, MOOR LANE, LONDON, E.C. SATURDAY, AUGUST 17, 1912. Communications to the Editor should be addressed to him at 33&35 Moor Lane, E.C. Advertisements, Subscriptions, &c., should be sent to the Manager, at the same address. The following are the rates of subscription to C e ic k e t :— Great Britain. Abroad. One Year ....................... 6s. 3d. ... 7s. 6d. The 24 Summer Numbers ... 5s. Od. ... 6s. Od. The 6 Winter Numbers ... Is. 3d. ... Is. 6d. NOTICE. Messrs. WRIGHT & CO., of 7 , Temple Lane, Tudor Street, E.C., areAdvertisementContractorsfor CRICKET, and will be glad to give their best attention to any Firms desiring to advertise in the paper. Scale of Charges will be sent on application. ll>a\nlion (Bosstp. T h e abstract an d brief ch ron icle o f the tim e. — Hamlet. W h a t a week ! Of the 17 first-class matches started between August 5 and 10 only 5 were finished ; and among the “ full scores ” wero such as : Kent 275. Hants 30 for 2 ; Essex 46 for 3, Derbyshire no innings ; Somerset 23 for 2, Gloucestershire no innings ; Somerset 116 for 3, Worcester­ shire no innings. Monday was not so bad but that it might have been worse ; Tuesday was wretched, and so was Wednesday ; Thursday was patchy ; Friday inproved ; Saturday relapsed. Here and, there the batsmen had wickets kept easy by showers, and made runs without difficulty, though seldom at any great pace ; but where the sun shone on sodden turf, caking ensued, and bowlers had their day. In three matches—at Leicester, Northampton, and Canterbury—on Friday 63 wickets realised only 524 runs, or a trifle over 8 each. I n spite of all the rain, and three blank days, the Can­ terbury Week must not be written down a financial failure. There were good attendances on Monday and Thursday, and it will bring quite a fair amount of grist to the mill. There was another Week—that at Leicester—which suffered more. Mr. S. C. Packer, the energetic Leicestershire Secre­ tary, had worked hard for months past to make this a huge success. All sorts of attractions had been devised ; but rain vetoed nearly everything.) B u t it is far too early yet to say—as some pessimists are saying—that County Cricket is doomed. The attend­ ances on several grounds on Bank Holiday, by no means an ideal cricket day, were good enough to prove that people will go to see cricket when they have time to do so, which is an argument in favour of Friday starts and the certainty (weather permitting) of a full afternoon’s play on Saturday. Next season will probably find this experiment given a fair trial, and one hopes and believes that the result will be good. M e a n w h il e Worcestershire has been saved for another year ; Somerset has made a capital start upon a Shilling Fund, and has Major Badcock coming from India to put her house in order ; and an anonymous benefactor has given Derbyshire very substantial help. If that anonymous benefactor chances to be looking round for another worthy institution to endow, I could-—but enough ! (N.B.— “ This is a goak,” of course.) , ( u M r . G e o r g e C r o u c h - —they will make him Mr. E. R. Crouch still, though one might have thought that by this time people would have learned that he is not his brother-— was my authority for the statement that the Australian Team would not go to America. It is now proclaimed that it will do so. But this is not strictly correct. Some of the men—the bigger proportion of the team—will travel home via the States and play a few matches ; but it is a private venture, and I am told that they will not play as the official Australian Team. This means, I take it, that while tho extension of the tour has the sanction of the Board of Control it will not be financed or managed by the Board. I f a n c y there can have been few people less surprised than myself that South Africa did well against Australia at Nottingham. Much of this talk about test match tempera­ ment seems to me mere hot air. There is such a thing, no doubt. But when people maintain that men liko Aubroy Faulkner, Arthur Nourse, Gordon White, and Sibley Snooke do not possess it, one can only assume that there exists amazing ignorance as to what these men have done in the past. What of the match at Jo’burg a few years ago when White, Nourse, and Percy Sherwell carried South Africa home to victory by a wicket ? Was not that the game when a spider’s web woven across one wicket stayed unbroken in spite of all the efforts of the English bowlers-—Haigh, Lees, Albert Belf, and John Crawford among them ? What of the splendid struggles made by Faulkner in Australia ? S o u t h A f r ic a is, o n th e w h o le , t h e w e a k e s t te a m o f th o th re e , w h ic h is v e r y m u c h w h a t on e m ig h t e x p e c t, fo r S o u th A fr ic a la b o u rs u n d e r th e b ig g e s t h a n d ica p . H e r p la y e rs are re a re d o n m a ttin g w ick e ts , re m e m b e r. B u t South Africa has more than one, or two, or three men of international calibre. It has been her misfortune that her best have seldom got going together, and that the luck of the weather—not so much in the actual test matches themselves as generally, the unsettled conditions preventing men used to iron-hard wickets from showing their true form —has been against her. If South Africa is no stronger than an average good county side, how is it that no county side except Lancashire—in a match in which the team batting last had no chance—has defeated her ? W h a t e v e r may be urged against county executives in this terrible season of 1912, it can hardly be said that they have neglected to try new men. I cannot remember another season in which so many first appearances have been made. Counties like Essex, Leicestershire, and Warwick­ shire, whose policy it seemed to be two or three seasons ago to play the same eleven as long as possible, have cast their nets far and wide. H e r e is a list, tolerably near completeness if not absolutely complete, of men who have made their bow in the ranks of first-class counties during 1912. I have not in­ cluded, unless by a slip, anyone who played in a previous season, even if he only played once or twice. D e r b y s h ir e : Blount, Burnham, Capt. R. Baggallay ; E s s e x : C. Mortlock, R. D . Clark, Hills, E . C. Coleman, Toone, Swann, Sutton, Hadden, Valiant, Smith, C. H . Douglas, R. H . Robinson, G. B. Davies, G. M . Louden ; G l o u c e s t e r s h ir e : W. W. Hoskin, A. K. G . White, E . H. Staddon, M . A. Green, Smith ; H a m p s h ir e : A. C. P. Arnold, A. P. Rutherford. F. G . Turner, Rogers, Yaldren, Pothecary (I fancy J. T. Budden played some years a g o ); K e n t : Collins ; L a n c a s h ir e : F. R. R. Brooke ; L e ic e s ­ t e r s h ir e : H . King, Skelding, H. Wright, E . F. Odell, Geary, H . M. Bannister ; M id d l e s e x : A. I. Steel, N . Haig ; N o r t h a n t s : L . E . Holland; S o m e r s e t : Capt. E . D . Tillard, House, N . Hardy, B. D. Hylton-Stewart, A. Pape ; S u r r e y : R. B. Lagden, G. V. Campbell; S u s s e x : R. K. Simms, E . C. Baker, R. G . Tudor, Relf (E . H.), Bowley, Tate (M.), T. H . W. Curtis; W a r w ic k s h ir e : Jeeves, T. J. Greening, H . W. Smith, G. R. Byrne, G. Walker, G . Farren; W o r c e s t e r s h ir e : Chester, Higgins, A. T. Cliff, C. P. Blewitt, A. C. Wilkinson ; Y o r k s h ir e : J. Tasker, E . L . Frith, J. H . B. Sullivan. T h e r e are nearly 70 names here. I may be mistaken about two or three of them, for I write without means of reference beyond a year or two back ; but I believe they are all genuine newcomers. There are others who have played in one, two, or a few matches before, such as Kilner, Oldroyd, A. J. Wood, C. K. Langley, Bayes, W. N. Riley, B. G. Stevens, P. G. H. Fender, A. H. Lang, B. H. Holloway,