Lives in Cricket No 2 - Johnny Briggs

would have nodded in agreement with that comment as they suffered a loss of £2,400 on this tour. On the field, though, both touring sides were successful although they were brought together on only one occasion – a game against a Combined Australian XI, which has been treated as a Test match since 1890. Briggs was one of the 11 players chosen from the 26 who would have been available for this match. This one-off Test, held at the Sydney Cricket Ground, started on 10 February, 1888. Briggs did little to justify his selection, making 0 and 14 and he wasn’t called upon to bowl as Lohmann and Peel ripped through the Aussies twice, with England completing a comprehensive win on the fifth day of this timeless Test. They had, in fact, only needed three days to polish off Australia as no play was possible on days two and three. On this 1887/88 tour, Shaw and Shrewsbury’s side played 26 matches in all, 19 of them against odds sides. If anything, the travelling by sea, rail and horse-drawn coach was more taxing than the tour of 1884/85, with matches in Australia as far apart as Adelaide in South Australia, Maryborough in Queensland and Bourke in northern New South Wales, which is almost 400 miles from Sydney. In fact, the Australians have a saying ‘back of Bourke’ which is similar to the oft-used ‘back of beyond’ and gives some indication of the distances travelled. After Australia, the tourists went on to New Zealand, crossing the Tasman Sea in very heavy weather, playing three matches – in Wellington, on North Island, and at Christchurch on South Island – on their eventual arrival. In New Zealand, Briggs had figures of 8 for 41 versus Wellington Twenty Two at Wellington and 9 for 43 versus Canterbury Eighteen at Christchurch and 9 for 26 against the same side in a second match at the same venue. They set off on their return journey to England from Port Lyttelton on the SS Coptic on March 31. Summing up the tour, Wisden reported that ‘Lohmann, Briggs and Shrewsbury were the mainstays of the side’. In the odds matches, Briggs scored 481 runs and took 178 wickets at an average cost of 5.16. In eight first-class matches in Australia, including the ‘Combined’ match, he scored 229 runs at 19.08 and took 30 wickets at 14.46. His highest first-class score was 75 against Victoria at the MCG just before Christmas and his best bowling was 6 for 40 against ‘An Australian XI’ at Sydney where he and Lohmann, bowling unchanged through both innings, bundled out the opposition twice inside two days. Briggs played in many odds matches and Taking a hundred wickets for the first time 41