James Lillywhite's Cricketers' Annual 1890

1 6 LILLYWHITE'SCRICKETERS' ANNUAL. otherwise disappointing , play up well against their " friends , the enemy " of Notts-and they made, as manywill remember well , a really good show against both Notts and Lancashire , only failing to get home, in the latter case , by a short head, that is to say, of three runs . Surrey , too , at the Oval , found them stout foemen, and they played up with great pluck only to experience another defeat , in what is now known to manyas the Gaslight Match, with two wickets to spare. Though their cricket generally was in manycases undoubtedly much below their real form in our opinion , particularly the fielding , which was, as we saw for ourselves , decidedly faulty , at the same time they were undeniably pursued by a succession of ill -luck . N o one , we are confident , would argue that ten defeats out of fourteen matches can fairly be considered as a reliable estimate of the merit of the Yorkshire eleven . Their only victories , indeed , were over Gloucestershire and Sussex , and the two drawn games were against Middlesex at Halifax , and Notts at Nottingham . Luck may have had, and did have , something to do with the poor show of Yorkshire , but still the figures , both in batting and bowling , did not present any very encouraging features . Hall and Peel batted well , and the latter's all -round cricket was by far the most satisfactory outcome of the season . With the exception of this pair , there was no batting average over twenty runs ; and Peel , who took more than twice as many wickets as any Yorkshire bowler , was more expensive than the majority of those who headed the averages of the other principal counties . Lord Hawke, Ulyett , Wade, and Lee , none of them came up to the standard of previous form as batsmen ; and though Wainwright did good service all round, and Whitehead at times was effective , the team would have fared badly hadnot Peel borne the brunt of the bowling with such success . Andwhat can be said in any way hopeful about Sussex cricket ? Little or nothing , if the records of 1889 are to be regarded as a fair test of the capabilities of the eleven . One undeniably good win over Yorkshire at Bradford , and a drawn game, clearly to their disadvantage , at Brighton against Gloucestershire -these are the only successes , one of them at the best a negative one , to the credit of the Sussex eleven . Otherwise , the season showed an unbroken series of defeats , ten in fact out of twelve matches played. That their position , too, is a fair reflex of their form will be seen by a comparison of their batting and bowling with the same tables of other counties , which will show that while the average of run-getting was the lowest of all , the wickets which fell to them during the summer were obtained at a heavier cost than those of any of the other seven competitors for the premiership of County Cricket . Quaife's ill -success -of which the only explanation can be one of bad health -asa batsman was a great disappointment to the supporters of Sussex ; and , in addition , the colt Major , who opened the season with such brilliant promise , fell off so surprisingly as to be of comparatively little use in the later matches . Mr. F. Thomas, of Cambridge University , too , was unable to take part in even one of the twelve first -class matches played , so that the county was entirely deprived of thehelp of one of quite its best batsmen. Withsuch an unfavourable combination of circumstances to face Mr. N e w h a mhad a very difficult task to perform , and it says much for his pluck and perseverance that his individual share of the cricket was so very creditable . He shared , in fact , with Jesse Hide the chief honours of the batting , and though the amateur had a considerable advantage , they were the only batsmen able to reach an average of over twenty runs . The bowling presents even worse figures , and in this department the wickets obtained bySussex cost , on the average , nearly one run more than those of Middlesex and Gloucestershire , the least successful of the other seven counties . The season of 1889 was altogether , it is much to be regretted , one full of disaster for the Sussex eleven , and what is still more discouraging to those who have to bear the heavy responsibilities of management , there does not seem to be the brightest of outlooks in the immediate future , to judge by the information which has reached us from head-quarters . D If the counties which are not included within the number of the blessed ,