Cricket 1913

386 CRICKET: A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. J ttly 12, 1913. Among his principal scores that season was one of ioo* for Gentlemen of Notts v. Gentlemen of Surrey. In 1886 he made 197* for the Castle v. Nelson, and his first engagement as a professional cricketer was with the club against which this big score was made. His con­ nection with Old Trafford began in 1889, and a good score for Colts of the North v. Colts of the South at Lord’s led to his being chosen to play for the county v. M.C.C. This initial appearance of his was in the same match in which Albert Ward and Arthur Mold first played for Lancashire. But Ward had represented Yorkshire in 1886, and Mold had figured in the Northants team, so that Paul alone of the three was a newcomer to county cricket. He made 36* in his first innings, and Ward scored 95 for once out in the game ; Mold’s share in it was small, Watson, Briggs, and Barlow doing most of the bowling. Paul’s best score that season was 60 v. Gloucestershire at Bristol. In 1890, though not played regularly, he did very well indeed, and his 65 (highest of the match) v. Yorkshire at Old Trafford and his 71* (highest for his side) v. Middlesex on the same ground deserve special mention. The latter had a big bearing on Lancashire’s victory. But it was not until 1895 that he gained a regular place in the side, and only in that season and the following one did he play throughout. In three successive matches at the end of May and beginning of June, 1895, he made the highest individual score for his side— 77* v. Leicestershire at Manchester in a total of 202, 87 v. Yorkshire at Sheffield, when he and Ward added 144 together, the only long stand of a match of moderate scoring, and 140 v. Kent at Man­ chester. Though he played several other useful innings, he only played one more long one that season ; but this was really a long one. The match was v. Somerset, at Taunton, and in it MacLaren made the first-class record score; Paul scored 177 in 190 minutes, and helped the old Harrovian to add 363 in that time. His highest in 1896 was 107* v. Sussex at Hove, which took him something like four hours. He occupied more than three hours in making 52 v. Yorkshire at Old Trafford ; but his caution was fully justified— the next highest score was only 17 and the total of the innings 139. It was not his fault that the White Rose side won by two wickets. Other scores of merit that season were 52 v. Kent, 50 v. Derbyshire, 47 v. Somerset, and 44 (top score) v. the Australians, all at Old Trafford, and 60 v. Warwickshire at Birmingham. He never played regularly after 1896, and his fourth and last century for the county was made against War­ wickshire on the Edgbaston ground in 1899. When he ran up his highest score of 65 (v. Derbyshire at Derby) for the 1897 season, he and Albert Ward put up 171 for the first wicket. An operation in 1900 put an end to his first-class career but not to his cricket. He has played in a fair number of matches since for the Manchester C. and G., but has never shown quite the run-getting capacity of his best days. For twenty-four years Arthur Paul has done loyal service to the Lancashire C.C. Whether he ever regrets that he took up cricket in preference to civil engineering probably no one knows but himself. Let it be hoped that he is not one of those— unfortunately they are far from few— to whom devotion to the game has resulted in considerable financial loss. A really good benefit should help to minimise any such loss which he has suffered, and from indications at the time of writing prospects of a substantial sum seem fair. Probably he would have reaped a better harvest if his benefit had been given him earlier ; but that cannot be helped now. Paul was a crack full back in the Rugger game in his earlier days, playing for the famous Swinton club, and in 1888 he toured Australia with the Shaw and Shrewsbury football team, of which A. E. Stoddart was also a member. He only missed one match during the tour, sometimes playing at back and sometimes in the scrum. j . n . P. -fTT)-*--------------------- Obituary. T h e R i g h t H o n . A l f r e d L y t t e l t o n , K .C., M .P., died at 2.40 a.m. on Saturday last, the 5th, a t a nursing home in London, after an operation. His illness was very sudden; he was top scorer in a match in Victoria Park (see p. 365 of last week's issue) only eleven days before his death. To the world at large it is a statesman who has passed away— a man of clean-cut con­ victions, fearless of speech, who had earned the respect and esteem of both sides of the House ; to us, who cherish cricket as the game of games, it is not only the statesman, but. the brilliant cricketer of days bygone— Eton, Cambridge, Middlesex, England — splendid wicket-keeper, dashing and stylish batsman, and — once and once only in big cricket— effective lob bowler. Alfred Lyttelton's public cricket career was not a very long one. The call to other fields came to him, and Middlesex never had his help after 1887. He first played for the county in 1877, and in the eleven years of his association with it 64 innings (3 not outs) yielded him 1656 runs with an average of 27-15. He was four years in the Eton X I. (1872-5), and four in that of Cambridge (1876-9— captain in his last year). For the 'Varsity he played 47 innings (5 not outs) for 1224 runs, the average 29-14. His scores in the” Varsity match were 43 and 47 in ’76, 4 and 6 in '77, 5 and 64 in ’78, and 53 and 12* in ’79— 234 in 7 completed innings, average 33-42. In the four matches he stumped 3 and caught 6 batsmen. In his ten matches for the Gentlemen v. the Players he batted 14 times and totalled 269, average 18-21; and in these half-seore games he caught 18 batsmen and stumped 7. A t the Oval in 1877 he caught five in the first innings of the Players, and caught one and stumped one in the second. In all first-class matches his batting figures were — Season. Inns. N.O. R. A. H.S. Sjasan. Inns. N.O. R. A. H.S. 1876 15 1 383 27-35 83 1883 9 1 555 69*37 181 1877 22 1 611 29-09 IOI x88| 16 0 4 i 7 26-06 103 1878 20 1 476 25-04 72 i 83 i { 1 63 21-00 47 * 1879 27 3 688 28-66 102 1887 4 0 121 302j 50 1880 19 2 452 26-58 120 1881 17 1 301 18-81 42 Totals 171 12 4432 27-87 181 1882 18 r 363 21-47 75 His centuries in first-class cricket were :— 101, M.C.C. v. Lancashire, at Lord’s, 1877. 100, Middlesex v. Notts, at Nottingham, 1877. 102, Middlesex v. Notts, at Nottingham, 1879. 120, Gent, of England v. Gent, of Kent, at Canterbury, 1880. 115, Eleven of England v. Camb. Univ., at Cambridge, 1883. 181, Middlesex v. Gloucestershire, at Clifton, 1883. 103, Gent, of England v. Camb. Univ., at Cambridge, 1883. He made his 101 at Lord’s in ’77 of 158 while in, and the next highest score of the innings was Wheeler’s 15. One 6 and twenty-one 4’s were included in his big score at Clifton, when he and I. D. Walker (145) added 324 for the second wicket. In spite of all that is said about the slowness of modern cricket, there is no evidence that the batsmen of thirty years ago scored faster than those of to-day. The evidence, in fact, is all to the contrary. The proportion of slow players was bigger then than it is now. Mr. Lyttelton was never one of these ; he never wasted time, and his play has been styled " the champagne of cricket ” ; but his big innings were not made at anything like the pace that might be imagined from the stories that have come down to us of the mighty men of old. That is of no consequence ; the true cricketer does not regard indiscriminate slogging as the highest of crick et; what does matter is that the man whom the cricket world mourns to-day was a real batsman with (I quote W. G.) “ a most commanding and beautiful style.” As for his wicket-keeping “ it was always first-class. , . . He was