Cricket 1912

MAR. 30, 1912. CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. 41 match, it may be as well to point out here that it must have been a club and ground, not a county game, for Messrs. Phillips and Foster did not play for Warwickshire together till after the younger man’s ability was well established. N u n e a t o n , by the way, will have a county match this year, Leicestershire playing there in June. These experi­ ments are all in the right direction. The Leicestershire authorities again give Hinckley a match, and break fresh ground at Ashby-de-la-Zouch. Horsham has a week in June, and one does not doubt that the little Sussex town will rise to the occasion. Dudley, Blackwell, Stourbridge, Dover and Coventry all seem to have established their claims to one or more of their respective counties’ matches. There have been failures, of course, and it will probably be some considerable time before Northamptonshire gives another match to Peterborough. B y the time these lines appear the M.C.C. heroes will be well on their way home from Australia. They sailed from Adelaide in th& Orvieto, on March 8th. Some­ thing in the shape of a national welcome has been mooted ; while the Warwickshire Committee have resolved to entertain Mr. Foster, Kinneir and Smith to dinner, and Cambridge will do honour to her famous son, John Hobbs. Mr. John Douglas, too, will have more than one chance of displaying any oratorical talent he may possess. J u s t under £276— that is the net result of John Herbert K ing’s benefit match in 1910 ! It is the irony of fate that such a hard-working and able exponent of the game should fare so badly. Something ought to be done to make such a result impossible ; but, with half the first-class counties struggling for bare existence, one hesitates to say what the proper remedy is. Leicestershire lost nearly £500 in 1911, and this year Jayes will take his benefit, so that the county club can scarcely be expected to do more. But King will doubtless have a match given him by the M.C.C. in due course. I t may be that the false promise of an early spring which the last few days of February and the first few of March showed was responsible for the unusual number of poetic effusions which have reached us lately. A good friend of C r ic k e t sends along these lines. W e l l P l a y e d ! o r , a G r a t e T r iu m p h . The old Club at Lord’s has been urning the Ashes, And gaining their goal by their try ! Were “ bump-ball ” the message which the wire flashes, W e’d be asking the resin why ! F.D.W. “ Bump-ball, the author explains, is used as meaning “ mistaken ” ; or, as a schoolboy with Australian sym­ pathies might have said if the last two matches had gone wrong for us, “ sucks to you ! ” This last is an editorial suggestion ; the slang, no doubt, is out of date, for the Editor’s schooldays belong to the dim past. Mr. S. A. C o w p e r , who hit so finely in the M .C .C .’s first match in the Argentine, hails from South Africa, 1 hear. His innings of 182 was a real display of fireworks, southern Suburbs followed on 237 runs in arrear. Cowper, who had batted eighth on the list in the first innings, went in first this time. He began with a 6 and a 4 off Wilson’s first over ; he hit Hill for 4, 4 and 6 off three successive deliveries, and Wilson later on for 4, 6, 4 and 6 on four. He made 48 of the first 60, and reached three figures with the total only 128. Altogether he was batting j minutes, making 182 out of 235 during that time, hitting eleven 6’s and 19 4’s. There were five men in the out field during the latter part of his innings ! A t the banquet given to the M.C.C. team by the ■tsuenos Aires Jockey Club Mr. A. C. MacLaren said that „ greeted by Mr. Harold Garnett with the remark : Why, Archie, you look over seventy ! ” The old England captain wanted to know whether this was a very encourag­ ing welcome. ■ A m o n g those present at the banquet one notes the names of Messrs. K . M. Carlisle, the old Oxonian, J. St. F. Fair, a contemporary of MacLaren’s at Harrow, E. M. Toulmin, who has played for Essex, J. O. Anderson, of Herts., and H. G. Garnett, of Lancashire. T h e second match of the tour, v. Combined Camps, was disappointing. In their first innings M.C.C. batted very poorly indeed, and in their second the men of the Camps fielded very poorly indeed, many chances being missed ; while towards the end the game degenerated into the farcical, Garnett allowing every man in the team to have a go at the batsmen. J. R. Garrod’s 88 was the one redeeming feature of the home side’s batting. L. H. W. Troughton’s century was a bright and stylish innings. T h e first “ test ” match (is it not almost time that some limitation was pUt upon the use of this phrase ?) was full of surprises. The tourists actually had seven wickets down for 33, Doming and F oy bowling particularly well. Lord Hawke and A. J. L. Hill showed that they are not yet quite done with ; but in spite of their efforts nine wickets were down for 80. Then Rugby and Eton, or Cambridge and Oxford, if you prefer it, came to the rescue ; and a splendid last wicket stand by E. R. Wilson and C. E. Hatfeild carried the score to 186. W h e n Argentina started, Jackson and Toulmin each had a life, but they stayed together until 57 was on the board. Hard hitting Cowper did not like Mr. “ Brownie ” H ill’s lobs at all this time, and, lashing out at one of them, was well caught on the boundary by Hatfeild. The total was 135 for 4 at the end of the first day’s play. Next day, after heavy rains, which prevented a start till 5.5, it was carried to 161 for 6, and it finished on the third day with Argentina 23 runs in the lead. T h e wicket was bad after the rain. M.C.C. had 4 down for 21. Bird and Troughton doubled the score for the fifth. But the best stand of the innings was the 66 added by Hill and Troughton for the seventh. Argen­ tina had 135 to make for victory, and less than two hours left for the task. A t once Jackson started to hit, with Toulmin playing a steadier game. A fine catch by Bird dismissed Jackson when he had scored 49 in excellent time. For a period thereafter run-getting slowed down so much that a win began to look out of the question. But Doming and Garnett woke matters up, the Lancastrian hitting the only 6 of the match, and the Republic won four minutes before time. A good win, too ! M a c L a r e n started his account of runs in his fifth innings in the Argentine, making seven therein after four successive failures. He has since scored more heavily, of course ; that was only to be expected. A. C. M. A u s t r a l ia , 1897-8— T h e A r g e n t in e , 1912. “ You have only to put out your tongue at the ball on the Sydney ground, and it goes for four.” — Mr. A. C. MacLaren, fourteen years ago. Mr. Archibald Campbell Mac In the days of yore was a crack. He thrust out his tongue— (And his willow outflung)— And the ball smote the pales with a thwack i At Sydney, and some time ago, That was, as you know (or should know), In a time much more recent His scores were scarce decent^— (Four nasty round blobs’ in a row !) Someone murmurs : “ Well, well, that’s a hot ’un ! What’s come to him to show form so rotten ? ” One can’t answer— unless I t’s to hazard a guess That to put out his tongue Mac’s forgotten !