James Lillywhite's Cricketers' Annual 1892

1 0 LILLYWHITE'SCRICKETERS' ANNUAL. waswhen it beat Yorkshire at Leeds , after a very plucky uphill game, with only a wicket to spare . Essex, too , can put a strong eleven into the field , and with its full strength it is a formidable combination to reckon with. The cry in county cricket is , Still they come! Last year Oxfordshire madeits first appear- ance , and with more than a fair amount of success . Worcestershire , too, is girding up its loins , and vigorous efforts are being made this winter to establish the county club on a satisfactory and permanent basis . The Inter - University match wasvoted to be again a really good thing for Cambridge. Still , though on public form, there could be no other opinion than that Oxford were the worse side , the match itself proved after all to be singularly exciting . The unexpected wasvery nearly happening again . The details of the gamewill be too fresh in the minds of those interested to need anything but a bare reference here . As it was, Cambridge, after having all the best of the " first hands," only had a very little in hand at the finish . Their victory , too , was in a very great measure the work of Mr. C. P. Foley. Butfor his plucky batting in the second innings , whenthings were going all in favour of Oxford , the latter might have managedto secure , whatwould have been in every sense , a sensational victory . Of Public School cricket it will be unnecessary to say muchin face of the elaborate analysis of the Rev. A. F. E. Forman, who has been for years the historian of the schools . Winchester , as far as we could judge, had an excep- tionally good eleven , and it would have been interesting to have seen howthey wouldhave fared against Harrowas well as Eton. In C. B. Fry, Repton has sent up to Oxford, not only a promising all -round cricketer , but a performer of considerably above the average in all branches of athletics . In R. P. Lewis, Winchester had a wicket -keeper of exceptional promise , and one whowith care and practice ought to take quite a front place in cricket in a year or two. Theheavy rains prevalent during the greater part of the season made1891 essentially a bowlers ' year. Still , the batsmen were not altogether at a discount as the averages of some of the leading players will show. Shrewsbury's record , in spite of early failures , was a remarkable one. All the four first places , too , it is worthyof notice , were occupied by professionals , Shrewsbury, Gunn, Abel, and Bean, to wit, in the order of merit. Next come Mr. A. E. Stoddart and Mr. T. C. O'Brien . In bowling , Lohmann, Peel , Attewell , Briggs , and Mold of theolderh a n d sare wellto the front. O n eof the n e wfeaturesof the season was the success of J. T. Hearne of Middlesex , who, in one season came, and deservedly , into quite the forefront of bowlers . Cricket , last year, lost several who have been in there time brilliant ex- ponents of the game. George Parr, most brilliant of leg-hitters , and one of the very best batsman in the fifties , died in June at the ripe old age of sixty -four . Consumption had EdwardBarratt the slow left -hand bowler who did Surrey such good service some ten years back, as one of its victims at the end of February. HumphreyPayne, at one time a co - lessee of the Eton and Middlesex grounds with Robert Thoms, passed awayin his sixty -sixth year in April . Of contemporary cricketers the worst loss was Joseph Hunter, elder brother of the present Yorkshire wicket -keeper , and for several years himself one of the very best of English stumpers . C H A P T E R III. P U B L I CS C H O O LC R I C K E TIN 1891. B YT H ER E V. A . F . E . F O R M A N . SOME years ago we were forced to issue a warning against the introduction of lawn -tennis , as a recognized game, into the athletic curriculum of our public schools . Wesaw in the game an insidious enemy, that , by its pleasantness and