General Gossipy.

NZ Truth, Issue 142, 7 March 1908, Page 3

General Gossipy.

Test Cricket.

Kopped by " The Kangaroo."

X soul-stirring shout is this Soutk- ;' ejcii hurrafh, Which over the cable flashes, To say that Old England is beaten again, And Australia has won' back t( The AshfS." . - It makes a man proud of the "Old Kangaroo',And the youth that now rules s his domains there For they've done it so well what was set them to do, That those historic ashes remain there. Good luck to the fallen ■!, They won't soon forget (Though they've ( shown themselves battlers, and cleverO That there's strength m the tail of ' "The Kangaroo" vet. And. his spring's just as mighty as ever.

' There's not much difference after all between the "Pick Test" and the "Tick Pest." ; If the umpire, were yested with the same power as the Rugby referee and given the right to order off or suspend from the getme any person dis-

puting his decision, however, mildly, it would lead to some fun. Happenings on the Basin this season would have led to wholesale suspensions had such a rule been m force. Outstanding features of a junior match on the Basin last Saturday*! were the number of batsmen who got! hit below the belt, and the catches made by the rival WicUet-keepers;-?bhe wicket "kicked" terribly, lience the reason ior the aforesaid happenings. It will no doubt be ne^« to many i cricketers 1 to hear, ■ on the authority ! 6$ a Sydjiey paper, that Harry Graliam, the once-famous" Victorian and. Australian rep., player, is an inmate,] of an asylum m Dunedin, and is m a i weak state, of health.' In three innings for the Ma State this season A. J. Bowden has . made 358 runs. He has not been oppressed: by the importance of the occasion, by te spectre of Test match selection* by exalting' the quality of the bowling, English or. colonial. ",Ped" (Wanganui).— lt was m 1876 that Selby visited , Australia and New. Zealand as a member of, an English) cricket team. He was reckoned a. flier over 100 yards and threw,, out a: challenge to any man m Australia 1 for £100. Bill Hipe, »then one of the. Commonwealth's champion rnimersi, immediately took up the challenge^ planked his gilt, met the and licked him byVtwo i^et; (2). lDis^ Selby was matched against \men: ai¥ ; . New Zealand; (3). ¥JlMtt was^ int. the same team. (4)-. Cb'uldtft .say 1;---have no records ' to. shoW that the player m question made three cen-. turies m succession m the same" month. ' " • Nine Australians have each scored 1000 runs or more m Test matches, and" of these five are New South Welshmen (Duff, Noble, TruMper, Gre* gory, and A. C. Bannerman),' and. three South Australians (HUI, Darling, and CHSen). ' • .Young Maefarlane, who Wpn his vr&yi'. into the Otago representatives this season', and p.layed a sound, innings 6f 46 against Southland, is only seventeen years of age. - ' • When Braund was asked to .bowl agaiusfc the Welshmen /in- the ■ second: N.S.W. v. England match, he rf had a trial ball or two ami a few persons an the hill voiced,- their objections for the trial ball "appeared to ti be overdone somewhat by ' one or two bowlers that day. ... , As a result , Braund kept on sen&jng idown trial balls, until the number was six. Most of our .players appear ;,to regard'batting with pleasure, bowling as something necessary for the batting, and fielding as the drudgery, of the game. The. sooner cr-icftet is taken up enthusiastically and ' seriously in 'its three distinct branches, and the practice of each, especially fielding, iv, as near as possible; the mariner of match play, the sooner will Wellington cricket forge afceSjd and receive the public suppoi-t it deserves. ! Eckhold, the Dunedin batsman, whose stonewallir%> proclivities was m . such strong evidence What time Otago and Wellington were battling against each other at Christimas, was at the batting crease for nearly four hours against Southland, his contribution at the end being 95. No" wonder the Dunedin critic makes the assertion that cricket m his city at present is dying a slow arid cruel death. Until life is infused into such dreary exhibitions,, the public will show, its appreciation by staying away. • Some years "ago "Pup" Hutchings carried a reputation of- a" sort by a continuous squeaking and yapping upon the field. Sinpe that voluble youth departed for Auckland a pleasant silence settled upon the Basin. Another talking Richmohdi however, has now taken, the field m the person of Mister Connolly, from Sydney. This gentleman bids fair to become a bigger nuisance than the aforesaid "Pup." Nearly every ba-ts^ man playing, against his tripe were made the subject ; of his opinions, generally to their disadvantage. So a word m time to this verbose youth may have the effect ' of cutting off his clap-trap, if not, he can look for squalls m the Tiear future. This lovely part of the Dominion is known as Windy Wellington, "and we don't desire any Connollys to swell the blast. In the Petone-Phoenix game . S.tan. Brice gave one of those. exhibitions of hitting that We used to expect - regularly from him. He was particularly strong on friend Hickey, driving that muoh-becurled gentleman all over the Basin. Had some of his hits been from the other end, it is probable that one or taro Old Boys' barrackers m the grandstand Would have been hit, which would have been sad. Ooimolly fizzled right but, another buWWc pricked. Lord knows ---what Petone would have done without Cobcroft's -bowling this season. Don Naughton is to be. classed amongst the century-makers of the season, the trick having b^en accompliShed against Gasworks last Saturday. Though not chanceless, it was nevertheless a bright and free expo- | sition of ba-tting. ' j Hooroo for the old' 'un. George Giffen played against tberPijian willow wielders at Holy Adelaide, and knocked down six of their houses for, 58 runs. • • ■'-+• \ Nobody will deny that the toss is at times a most important element in' cricket. How the toss influences cricket has been shown m a more or less harrowing Way. to one side or. the other, m Test matches.- For instance, m 1905, F. S. Jackson had first call from Joe Darling m all five Tests m England. It depressed the 'Stralians. Fortuna-tely, such a run of luck m the' spinning of the coin by the captain of a side m a series of games is infrequent, otherwise there would probably be an agitation to abolish the existing method of determining which side shall 'b" at first. Albert Trott is a veracious chronicler. In his contribution to a London paper he retails? the story about George Ulyett, the famous Yorkshire cricketer, tumbling out of a bqat : at Bqurke m N.S.W:, aird just missing giving Mr. "Sharkie"" a. substan^ia.! meal. In the interests; of eniigfa-. tion the exact distance of Bourkej from the seaboard should, have been stated, with the explanation ...that the sharks who undoubtedly infest they locality, are generally the proprietor's of "lambing-down" shanties, and neither live m nor on the water.;