TEST CRICKET

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 515, 19 November 1928, Page 8

TEST CRICKET

AUSTRALIA will no doubt devote less concern to the result of the Federal elections than to the fact that the batting strength of the English cricket team has so far shown itself to be more than the equal of the Australian bowling attack. Cricket skill and supremacy seem to run in definite cycles, and though it is early yet to prognosticate with certainty, it seems likely that England will maintain her recent advantage in the tests that are soon to begin. A great deal of interesting history, some great and noble names in the record of sportsmanship, and the colourful memory of some wonderful achievements, are to be found in the story of the tests between England and Australia. The record goes back over fifty years, to the meeting of J. Lillywhite’s team with Australian elevens in Melbourne and Sydney. Hitherto England had conceded odds. The Australians were still serving their apprenticeship. But they came out of it as finished craftsmen, winning five out of the seven tests played between 1876 and 1882. Their merit became firmly established under Murdoch in 1882, when a powerful English side, that included Grace, Lyttelton and C. T. Studd, Avas beaten by seven runs.

From Lillywhite to Chapman there have been great cricket leaders, with great players to support them: —W. L. Murdoch, perhaps the most polished of all Australian batsmen; Ivo Bligh, iioaa t Lord Darnley, Avho won the hearts of feminine Melbourne, and was presented by his fair admirers Avith the urn and the ashes; A. E. Stoddart, Avho Avas a fine Rugby threequarter, and led a football team in NeAv Zealand as Avell as a cricket team in Australia: and many another, doAvn to Douglas, Armstrong, and ‘‘Lucky” Collins.

i he tests, unfortunately, lead a lot of people and a number of critics to lose the true perspective, to say and write many foolish things. It is hardly by such comment, that the historic cricket occasions should be judged. Rather should they be regarded, Avhatever the result, as a vital influence in keeping people on opposite sides of the globe interested in each other’s doings.