Cricket 1913

M arch 15, 1913. CRICKET : A WEEKLY RECORD OF THE GAME. 79 of J. W. Zulch : 97— 35 — 33 — 33 — 87— 45 = 330, average 55. And Zulch has had no chance to practise. I had the good fortune to see his last two efforts, and though each was marred b y a couple of chances they demonstrated th at among Rand batsmen he is almost in a class b y himself. If he would only give up flicking at off balls, which should be left alone, he would be a first w icket batsman of the highest o rd er; bu t I fear that lessened opportunities of practice and match play will scarcely help him to eradicate this defect. The ex-Border player, A. E. Cooke, has been going strong for Pretoria, w ith 0-18-57-141-77-17-85* =395, average 65-83, which puts him next to Bennett. But when I wrote the foregoing pars. I had not heard of his latest effort. The Pretoria scores don’ t always come through as punctually as they might. Another Pre- torian, C. E. Newnham, has also been doing well : i2-56-g-64-83-53*-20 = 297, average 49-50. Other men who have rendered their clubs valuable service are F. K. Campling (Yeoville) with 47-28, W. J. Bird (Wanderers) with 46-50, C. R. Hand (S.A.R.) with 45-50, L. J. King (Pirates) with 42-80, J. V . Morkel (V.M.R.) with 41-75, J. H. Rutherford (Pirates) with 39-71, A. S. Frames (Wanderers A) with 38-12, H. Quinton (Wanderers) with 37-66, H. Deane (E.R.U.) with 37-57, W. T. Gardner (Crown Mines) with 36-11, V. L. Henwood (Pirates, but now returned to Durban) with 32-16, F . Le Roux (S.A.R.) w ith 31-75, and H. B. Strieker (Pirates) with 3 i - 5 7 - Well-known names are missing from the above list, and English readers will probably have more than a passing interest in these figures : L. J. Tancred, 35-4-2- 35-14-0-68-62-29; R . Beaumont, 50-5-46-2 ; S. J. Snooke, 25-58-20-29*-58-2g-i6-6-0 ; S. J. Pegler, 0-26- 21-0-42-51-25 ; M. J. Susskind, 22-29-30-26-10-1-44. Susskind, b y the way, returns to England very soon, having been offered a scholastic appointment. He has been immensely popular here during his short stay in the town of his birth after years of absence, and we regret his going— -selfishly, perhaps. He has proved himself one of the best batsmen in the province. J. H. Sinclair, 70-43-24-11-25-7-0 (N o t e .— this was, of course, written before Sinclair’ s sudden death .— E d it o r ), and E. C. Moses (late of Repton), 0-0-2-30-0-47-21-20, may be mentioned with the other players known on English grounds. No score made in a second innings which possessed no bearing on the result of the game has been included here, I may say. V ery often the conditions under which such second innings are played border on the farcical, and quite often, too, the scores are not even published, being considered of no account. Only three bowlers have been at all consistently successful— F. W. Elworthy, S. J. Pegler, and H. V. Baumgartner. It is unfortunate that Baumgartner’s complete figures cannot be given, as the detailed score of one or two Pretoria games never got into print at all. Pegler has taken 33 wickets for 367 runs for E.R.P.M . The figures are good ; but he is flattered somewhat by them, for a large percentage of his wickets were those of tail-enders, to whom he is a veritable terror. To good batsmen Pegler presents few difficulties on matting wickets. And here I must refer to a mistake made by the Editor in re-shaping a paragraph of my letter in the January number. He made me say th at we don’t doubt now that Pegler is a great bowler on matting. I wish we didn’ t ! I fear most of us harbour grave doubts still. Pegler himself admits that he cannot do on the matting the things he did on English turf. It may seem an extreme statement to make ; but if it were not for the fact that he is such a useful batsman Pegler’ s place in the full series of next season’s tests would be no certainty. E lworthy is quite a youngster. This is his first season in senior cricket. No one on the Rand bowls the googly better. He sends down a lot of bad balls, it is true, but he has youth in his favour, and should im­ prove. As his record now stands it is fairly comparable to Vogler’ s last season for Randfontein. Here are the figures : 1 for 57, o for 28, 1 for 27, 6 for 64, 7 for 104, 6 for 69, 7 for 81, 5 for 73, 5 for 46, 2 for 102 =40 for 651. The most noteworthy incident in Cape cricket is undoubtedly the mammoth partnership of M. Commaille and W. F. Yeoman, who raised Cape Town’ s score v. Alma on February 1, from 10 for 1 to 292 for 2. Yeoman made 145, Commaille 197*. This was a remarkable match. Alma, batting first, lost 6 good wickets for 84, at which stage C. Fock (117) and G. P. Taylor (72) stopped the procession, and added 162 for the seventh wicket. A. Tregidga’ s virile 53* further improved matters, and the total reached 337. Bowley, by the way, failed to score. A total of 337 takes a lot of passing; but, thanks to Commaille and Yeoman, it was easily left in the rear, and at 475 for 8 Commaille declared the innings closed. This was a pity. He did not know how near 200 he was, and there was little use in the declaration, for Alma were not likely to be fired out for a paltry score in the time left. The record partnership at the Cape, b y the way, is 300, by S. E . Horwood and S. J. Snooke, for Cape Town, some years ago. Yeoman’ s only chance was after passing his century, and Com­ maille’s innings was chanceless. Commaille is in great form this season. Up to date he has scored 816 runs for 11 times out in senior club and Currie Cup matches, only once being dismissed under double figures. He began with 108 v. Green Point, then made 105 v. Western Province and 103 v. O.F.S. (Currie Cup match), and since has scored the big innings just dealt with. Last season he totalled 797 runs in 17 innings, twice npt out, average 53-13. B y this time he must have lived down the prejudice against him not only here but at the Cape as well, mainly due to his failure in Australia. Prominent members of the 1911 Western Province Currie Cup team told me he ought never to have been chosen for the Australian tour. Yeoman’s success is also particularly pleasing. It astonished me to find that he only scraped into the W .P . team v. Transvaal as a reserve, and thereafter was dropped out of the eleven against the O.F.S. Last Saturday he made 47 against Western Province (the club, not the Currie Cup side— this distinction is one