Lives in Cricket No 39 - Alec Watson

72 Thompson mentions that David Buchanan was a splendid medium to slow left-hand bowler. He may have been introduced to Watson by Johnny Sands. At any rate Buchanan seems to have askedWatson if he would like to learn to become a medium to slow ‘break-back’ bowler; or Watson may have done the asking. However, in The Cricket Field interview, mentioned above, Watson is somewhat vague with regards to his relationship with Buchanan. At any rate, that type of bowling seems to have been a relatively new feature in the game, and apparently James Southerton, then a noted Surrey bowler, was the only notable exponent of the art operating in the county game. Just possibly that may have opened Watson’s eyes to the prospect of a professional career playing county cricket in England. There is no evidence that any suspicion was cast on the validity of the bowling actions of either Buchanan or Southerton. Buchanan too had started as a fast round-arm bowler, but turned to spin about 1864; though it was in the 1870s, when he was in his forties, that he had his best period. Southerton had begun as a round-arm bowler, but as over-arm bowling was legalised and came into vogue, so his action became more over-arm. Also David Buchanan was a noted amateur cricketer, having won a Blue at Cambridge University and played for the Gentlemen. His connections with Cambridge and the Free Foresters, and probably with MCC, all bastions of amateurism and the concept of fair play in cricket, would imply Buchanan would take a dim view of any transgression of Law X. One would presume that he would not countenance ‘throwing’ in his own bowling action, so surely he would not encourage a player who had a suspect action or would induce a player to learn a bowling action that might be interpreted as a throw? While one can only speculate on how exactly Buchanan at that time instructed Watson to change from his mode of bowling from round-arm fast to slow off-break, Thompson tells us that he instructed Alec in the grip and action necessary to achieve a break-back. It would seem from experiment that trying to achieve break-back with a round-arm action is far from easy. However, in an interview in the Athletic Journal of 9 August, 1887, Watson said that he preferred slow bowling because he could get more work on the ball, and could get more pace off the pitch and thus deceive the batsman. Was it this ‘quicker’ ball, which seemed to cause the batsman so much trouble, which led to suspicion about Watson’s action? He himself also said that he got good break from the off ‘with a twist of the wrist, that used Chucker?