Cricket 1913

August 23, 1013. CR ICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. tingent. F. L. Fane and M. C. Bird w-ill certainly g o ; D. C. Robinson on ly waits upon the W ar Office’s consent; G. L . Jessop may go. What a thrill that last piece o f news must have caused in South A frica ! Let us hope the Id ol will not say nay. He will get a rare hearty welcome from the L ion ’s Head to the Rand. Not in Rhodesia, however. But that is not because he would not be welcome there. Unfortunately, Rhodesia cannot raise the guarantee asked, and the team w ill not visit Salisbury and Bulaw lyo. The fu ll total o f the guarantees requ red is over £ 5 >000> thus d iv id e d : Transvaal, ^ 2 , 100 , fo r two tests, tw o Transvaal matches at Johannesburg, one Transvaal match at Pretoria, and a game each at Potchefstroom and V ogelfon tein (provisional— alternative Lad ysm ith ); Natal, ^ 1 , 300 , fo r two tests, one Natal game at Durban, and one at Maritzburg, or ,£ 1 , 400 , if a game is p layed at Ladysm ith instead o f at V o g e lfon te in ; Eastern Province, £7/0, one test match at Port E lizabeth, Cape Province match at the same place, and Eastern Province match at Grahamstown ; Western Province, £ 450 , two Western Province games at Cape T ow n ; South-Western Districts, £ 2 ^ 0 , matches at Oudtshoorn and Robert­ son; Border, £ 22 ^, matches at East London and King W illiam stow nG r iq u a la n d West, £ 150 , match at K im berley; Orange Free State, £ 150 , match at Bloemfontein. The fixture list has now taken something like definite shape, and w ill be found on another page. The congestion o f matches in Natal has been avoided, it w ill be seen; but there are four games on the Rand in succession, which seems rather over­ doing it, though they are at h oliday time. One hopes that labour troubles w ill not interfere with the success o f the tour. L o rd Hawke’s first team had to forego a game at Johannesburg ( 1895 - 6 ) on account o f the disturbed state o f the political atmosphere, it may be remembered. I have had another rebuke from Clarence M ood y , o f the Sporting Mail (Adelaide). What does some poet or other say aboiit the knocks administered by a friend ? I can’t remember, and anyhow he doesn’t say it in those words. The latest knock is due to my statement that Clement H ill had no need to come here with Australian teams to make money. C. P. M. says that when H ill came here in i 8()6 he was an apprentice in the State engineering works at is. a day. W ell, I hope Clement d id not try to live on it, that’s a l l ! I f he did, he has long ago given up any such meagre and Spartan diet as it would have afforded him, I am sure. D o you remember old Tom Emmett’s remark about Arm itage (was it? ) and Pouis H a ll— the Law and the Gospel— Substance and Shadow ? The A dela ide crack in these days would ha rd ly be in the picture as Shadow ,” would he ? On Thursday in last week Pelham Warner, after fielding fo r a short time at L iverpool, felt unwell, and retired from the game, his place being taken, o f course with H ornby’s consent, by Lee. This was in direct contravention o f a M .C .C . ruling— “ not that I mind,” as the Grand Duke sa id ; but the papers generally considered that the fact o f the two captains having entered into an agree­ ment beforehand minimised the transgression. Which is surely curious lo g ic ! W h y , that agree­ ment was in itself a conspiracy— I use the word in the purest Pickwickian sense, be it understood. The Daily Chronicle on Saturday said, in g ood - sized type, well leaded, and with a. headline, that Warner might be well enough to p lay at Trent Bridge on M onday. In much smaller type, tucked away among paragraphs about footballers and the like, it chronicled Aubrey Faulkner’s score o f 205 for the M.C.C. v. Dorsetshire. Is not this rather out o f proportion ? O f two fam ous players one does not feel quite well, and may or may not p la y in his county’s next match— and may make a duck or may a century if he does p la y ; another has a two hundred score to his credit— an accomplished fact. Surely the latter news is more important than the former ? But then Dorset is on ly one o f the little second- class counties, and, though Dorset’s team has won two or three uphill games in gallant style quite lately, it would be absurd to expect the public to take Dorset seriously, I suppose. Is not that the view ? I don ’t share it personally. I believe that there is a strong section o f the public ready and w illing to be interested in second-class county cricket— if on ly it is given news concerning it in an interesting manner. U p to the end o f the New York portion o f the Australian tour Bardsley and Macartney had each scored over a thousand runs, and John C raw ford had taken over i q o wickets, while A . A. Mailey, if he had not actually reached the hundreds (scores and analyses are discrepant in some cases) was very close to that figure in wickets. W . E . P a rk e , w h o sc o re d tw o c e tu rie s fo r D o rse t v. M .C .C ., is an o ffice r in th e 2 nd. D u rh am L ig h t In fan try, an d h a s m a d e n o en d o f runs fo r his re g im en ta l eleven . E . R ile y , th e L a n c a sh ire p ro ., a fte r a lo n g stay at G a in sb o ro u g h , w ill n ex t season b e a t H a slin g d en )L a n c a sh ire L e a g u e). A w r ite r in th e Athletic News sa v s th a t S ta ffo rd ­ sh ire is a on e-m an sid e. T h is w ill b e n ew s to S ta ffo rd sh ire p e o p le ! B a rn e s is grea t tru ly ; b u t B e r ­ n ard M ea k in , P e rc iv a l B rig g s, N ic h o ls, M organ , D eves, an d se v e ra l o th e rs a re all q u ite g o o d en o u g h fo r first- cla ss cric k e t.