James Lillywhte's Cricketers' Annual 1884

M A R I T H EAVERAGESOF 1883. 4 2 4 1 9 3 C H A P T E R V I I. T H EA V E R A G E SO F 1 8 8 3. T H EB A T S M E N . T H Efigures which follow are those of the most successful cricketers of the past season . Theprevalence of hard wickets enabled batsmen to show up more pro- minently thanusual , and nine exceeded a thousand runs. Ulyett has the highest aggregate ,with 1562 runs for 49 completed innings , and considering the amountand quality of cricket he played his figures are very fine . Halls ' advance in batting wasoneof the most noticeable features of the season ; the advantages of a strictly defensive style of batting were never more thoroughly proved, and he was really the most successful professional batsman of the year. Barnes , though he began badly, finished the season in brilliant style . Shrewsbury played good cricket throughout . Flowers and Bates , both vigorous batsmen, also got over 1,000 runs, andtheir hitting was at times brilliant . Gunn's batting showed a marked advance , and George Hearne was also more successful . Neither Lockwood, Barlow, nor Maurice Readwere quite as reliable ; on the other hand Abel made a surprising advance as a batsman, and his cricket for Surrey throughout the season was exceptionally good . Among the amateurs , Messrs . C. T. Studd, W .W . Read, and W.G. Grace, were the chief run getters . Mr. Grace, though notquite as reliable as a few years ago, has still no superiors . Messrs . C. F. Studdand Read, though, ran him close and both played brilliant cricket , though the former had rather the advantage in first -class matches. H o n. Alfred Lyttelton , though he was only able to appear in August, batted with extraordi- nary success ; and of the other batsmen, Lord Harris , Messrs . I. D. Walker, E. M. Grace, and J. Shuter, all came out well . Messrs . A. G. Steel , A. P. Lucas, H. Whitfeld , J. G. Walker, and J. Cranston have also good averages . T h emostnoticeable advanceamongthe neweramateurswas that of Mr. W .E. Roller . His play was altogether a marked improvement on anything he had previously shown, and there were few better batsmen in the South last year. SCORESOF 1,000R U N SD U R I N GS E A S O N Inns. T i m e s n o to u t. M o s tin R u n s. a nInns. Average. B a r n e s B a t e s 5 1 4 1 3 0 8 1 2 0 2 7 . 3 9 4 6 2 1 0 2 4 7 9 23.12 F l o w e r s . 4 9 3 1 1 4 4 1 3 1 2 4 . 4 0 G r a c e, W .G. 4 1 2 1 3 5 2 1 1 2 3 4 . 2 6 H a l l 4 4 9 1 1 8 0 1 2 7 3 3 . 2 5 R e a d, W .W . 3 9 6 1 5 7 3 1 6 8 4 7 . 2 2 Shrewsbury 4 0 2 1 1 1 7 9 8 2 9 . 1 5 Studd, C. T. 3 6 5 1 1 9 3 *1 7 5 4 1 . 4 Ulyett 5 4 1 1 5 7 2 8 4 30.42 A V E R A G E SO F2 5R U N SA N DU P W A R D S . T i m e s M o s ti n Inns. notout. R u n s. a nInns. Average. Asher, A. G. G. 1 1 0 2 8 4 1 8 2 25.9 Diver, E. J.. 2 2 1 5 4 1 9 8 25.16 Harris,Lord 3 1 1 9 1 9 1 1 8 30.19 Henery, P. J. Т. 7 0 2 1 0 7 6 3 0 . 0 K e y,K .J. 8 1 1 9 7 *6 0 2 8 . 1 Lucas,A .P. 2 3 3 6 6 4 9 7 3 3 . 4 L u m b, E.... 1 5 4 2 7 7 *7 0 2 5 . 2 Lyttelton , H o n. A. 9 1 5 5 5 1 1 5 69.3 H