James Lillywhite's Cricketers' Annual 1891

PUBLICS C H O O LC R I C K E TI N 1890. 1 3 place , and his performances for Lancashire , after the end of term at Harrow, were so strikingly good as to render us very sanguine about his future . These prodigies often enough, it is true , falsify their school reputations bypoor displays at Oxford or Cambridge -and , perhaps , Harrow has been unduly favoured with disappointments of this kind-but wetrust that MacLaren's success will not end withhis school days. H ebatted most consistently well last summer, and is an admirable field at mid-off . Another very good player is Wells , of Dulwich, who stands second to MacLarenonly because he has not served so successful an apprenticeship in first -class companyas the Harrovian. H eis a fine , free hitter , a n da mostuseful bowler; w e hope to see h i m also m a k ehis m a r kin higher circles . The trio of leading public school batsmen is completed by Palairet , of Repton, whois held to stand a good chance of joining his brother in the ranks of the DarkBlues next year. His average is 53, and, though he was palpably over -played in August , he did tolerably well for Somersetshire . Whenat his best he is a difficult wicket to get , and, in addition to this , he is a sure and brilliant fieldsman . Amongthe school batsmen of 1890 we rate these three the highest , but they were closely followed by others . Bathurst , of Radley, shows a great deal of promise in every way, and Blaker's form at the end of the Westminster season stamps him as having lots of batting in him. Amongthe rest the most prominent were Fry (Repton), Warner and Whitting (Rugby) , Raikes (Shrewsbury ), Mordaunt and Wood(Wellington ), H. D. Leveson Gower (Winchester ), Thesiger (Cheltenham ), Field (Clifton ),Brewis and A. R. Hoare (Eton), andLambert (Sherborne ). A m o n gthe bowlers there is no startling phenomenon to report . Several of themdid very well for their respective sides ; Leigh Clare , of Sherborne , in particular , proved very deadly , and his record of 60 wickets for eight runs each is a very good one. H e has gone, we understand , to Cambridge, and there , w h e nthey lose their great fast bowler, he may, perhaps , get a good trial . Giffard , of Westminster , and Pope, of Harrow, also took numerous wickets cheaply ; Macnamara, of Marlborough, is spoken of very highly , as he bowls withplenty of pace and spin . Others who shone with the ball were Forbes (Eton),whohas not muchpitch , but got onextremely well without it, to judge by his analysis ; Taylor (Rugby), Etlinger (Marlborough), Marshall (Tonbridge ), andBoger (Winchester ), though the last -named was not up to his mark of the yearbefore. A m o n gthe wicket -keepers we single out Gowans(Harrow) and Macpherson (Cheltenham ) as the best . Among fieldsmen pure and simple we make no invidious selections , for it would be a most pernicious thing if wecaused it to be thought that the brilliancy of any one particular individual could atone for general slovenliness . The brunt of the bowling or the batting m a ybe borne by a single player , but excellence in fielding should extend through the whole side . Inmentioning the above leading lights we have dealt only with English school cricket , andhave purposely not included any of the Scotch boys, as w e intend to treat of them separately , after commenting on the various English schools in alphabetical order . There was nothing particularly noticeable about Bradfield cricket last summer, for out of eight matches the school only wona couple , and lost six . The batting averages appear to point to the existence of a lengthy " tail , " the last nine on the list ranging between 11 and 4. Thecaptain , Smyth, was con- sidered disappointing as a batsman, but he averaged 30, so that muchmusthave beenexpected of him. Barnes came next with 26 , and is a free hitter , who is recommendedto study defence . Warren and Reiss did nearly all the bowling of the side , and the former was, in addition , the safest field in the team. About the rest there is little to be said , for they did very little . The captain is stay- ing on for another season , and will retain the services of five of the present eleven, Considerable interest always attaches to the doings of the Brighton boys , and they have been so strong in recent years that possibly we look for more from them than we have a right to expect . W ecannot hope to find a Woods