CRICKET.

Taranaki Daily News, 26 February 1916, Page 7

CRICKET.

GREAT GAMES OF OLD. HISTORY-MAKING WATCHES. BOME NOTABLE itELICS, Veaiorieg of many famous Seeds upon the cricket field are recalled by the auction of relics of matches of the past which was held in Melbourne recently in Connection with the cricketers' tribute to Australia's wounded soldiers. That collection of relics, given by many wellknown cricket enthusiasts, who valued them highly, for the benefit of the Australian Wounded Soldiers' Fund, was probably the finest of its kind ever grouped together. It represented over half a century of first-class cricket. Although they were not the relics which brought the highest prices—that honor was reserved for certain autograph bats of W. L. Murdock and Victor Trumper—the scoring-book and the registered colors of the Australian Eleven which visited England in . 1882 wore the mementoes of the great historical interest. The colors are the only ones known to be in existence. They were presented by John McCarthy Blackham, greatest of wicket-keepers, and it is pleasing to find that Mr. H. Austin, who bought them for 25gns, handed them back to Blackham. That excellent example was followed by Mr. T. Millear, who paid 33gns for the scoring-book, and thou handed it back to Mr. T. Horan "Felix," of the Australasian—who was a member of the 1882 team, and who had possession of the book. In that book are recorded the scores of the famous "seven runs match" between Australia and England in 1882. The ball which Blackham gave to the Victorian Cricket Association for the cricketers' tribute, and which, independently of the auction sale of relics, produced £612 for the fund, was the ball with which Spofforth settled hopes in that game. Naturally,' then, it is to the great match of 1882 that one's thoughts turn first in glancing through this list of mementoes of cricket. ' THE ORIGIN OF "THE ASHES." That match on Kennington Oval, on Monday, August 28, and Tuesday, August 29, 1882, was not only the most exciting ever played in the whole history of test matches in cricket, but was also the one which brought the mythical "ashes" into existence—pardon the Irishism! Murdoek's second team played 38 matches in Great Britain, but only the one test match, and that against the most powerful side England could put into the field. Heavy rain on the Saturday before the match had made the wicket very treacherous. The Australians batted first, and could do little with the bowling of Barlow and Peate, the way in which the ball came back on the treacherous wicket troubling them sorely. Six wickets fell for 30 runs, of which W. L. Murdock made 13. Then Blackham got 17 and Garrett 10, and the score reached 63 before the last man was dismissed. Barlow got five wickets for 19 runs; he bowled 22 maidens in 31 overs. Peate, who bowled 24 maidens in 38 overs, got four wickets for 31. The Englishmen's first innings was completed on the same day, but it was a better one than the Australians', the, total being 101. In that innings Spofforth, the "Demon bowler," got seven wickets for 46. The highest scorer was George Ulvett, of Yorkshire, who then was but little inferior to W. G. Grace as an all-round player. He scored 20 in that innings. During the night rain fell again, and for a time on the Tuesday morning the English bowlers were at a disadvantage. H. H. Massie, the mighty smiter, who had banged up 206 runs against Oxford in the first match of the tour, seized the opportunity and hit finely for 55 before he'was bowled by A. O. Steel. Then the drying wicket became very difficult. W. L. Murdock batted finely for 29 runs before he was run out, but none of the later batsmen reached double figures, and the innings closed at 122. So the Englishmen needed only 85 runs to win the game. They lost two wickets for 15. Then Ulyett joined "W.G.," and in less than threequarters of an hour 50 went up. A win for England seemed certain. But at 51 Ulyett was snapped up by Blackham, off Spofforth, and at 53 A. C. Bannerman, at mid-off, caught Grace, oft' Boyle's bowling. A. P. Lucas and the Hon. A. I.vttelton, splendid batsmen both, lost no. time in beginning to score, and 60 went up. ,

WHEN STRONG MEN FAINTED. Now, to quote C. P. Moody's graphic description in "Australian Cricket and Cricketers," suddenly a new phase came over the innings. "The batsmen could not get the ball past the fieldsmen. Spofforth was bowling the most remarkable break-backs, at a tremendous pace; Boyle, from the other end, maintained a perfect length; Blackham, with matchless skill, took every ball that passed the batsmen, and there were many of them from Spofforth; every fieldsman strained his nerves to the utmost. A dozen successive :-naidens were sent down. Something of the spirit of the struggle pervaded the thousands of spectators, and their oppressive silence was punctuated by a mighty shout when a single to Lyttelton broke the spell. This solitary single deserves a lino to itself, for has not Spofforth himself written that, so that he might bowl at Lyttelton instead of Lucas, it was arranged that a ball should be niisfielded to enable the batsmen to change ends? Four more maidens, and then a trimmer from the Demon broke on to Lyttelton's wicket. Still there were left A. G. Steel and C. T. Stndd, two of the finest batsmen in England, besides Maurice Read, Barnes, and Peate, and only 19 to win. Only lft! Tlioy could get no more than 12 of them. 'Now,' to quote the late Charles Pardon, most graceful of English cricket writers, 'within sight of goal, when a triumph seemed all but assured, came the dreadful breakdown, which will always be remembered against English batsmen as one of the most conspicuous instances of failure at a supreme crisis.' Steel was caught and howled at 70, Read was clean-bowled second hall, and at ?5 Lucas, who had batted with amazing coolness, played on. Now Boyle's pertinacious accuracy • was rewarded. Off the first ball of his over Barnes was dismissed. Peate, the last man, came in, swished the first hall to leg for two, ftukily played the next one, tried to hit the last of the over, but missed and it bowled him. The game was won. Studd did not have a stroke. Spofforth had taken seven wickets for 44 (14 for 90 in the two innings), and Boyle three for 19. Spofforth sent down his last 11 overs for 10 maidens, two runs, and four wickets. In those days four balls comprised an over. So keen was the strain on the spectators that many men fainted. One man dropped dead. Men who were noted for their coolness were trembling like leaves. When the spectators were so affected, what must the strain on the batsmen have been! On the day ftfter the match, one English newspaper

published in its columns a black-bor-dered "In Memsriaia" notice, the wording of which .was as follows:—"In affectionate remembrance «f English Cricket, which died at the Oval on 29tfe August, 1882. Deeply lamented by a large circle of sorrewing friends and acquaintances. R.I.P. N.B. —The body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia." It was ;the last phrase of that notice which brought the mythical "ashes" into cricket. HOW THE TEST MATCHES :,r STARTED. Glancing down the list of other relics one comes across these entries: "Small photograph of 1878 Australian Eleven, taken in England," and "Cribbage board of Mr. .T. Conway, manager of the first Australian team to visit England; used by the team throughout the tour." It was that team which John Conway, the old Victorian intercolonial player, took to England in 1878 which really made cricket history so far as matches between Australia aid England are con-, cerned. In the pre«o"js season an Australian eleven had ueaten Lillywhite's team, in Melbourne, by 45 runs, but at Home it was still considered that only Englishmen could play cricket properly. So very little interest was taken in the arrival in the Old Country of Conway's team, which was captained by D: W. Gregory. When, in the first match of the tour, Nottinghamshire, -scoring* only 153 runs beat the Australians by an innings and 14 runs, England's conviction that the visitors would be as pupils at the feet pf a master deepened. No match between the Australians and in all-England team had been arranged. What was the use? England was soon to learn that Australia was entitled to liome-and-home test matches, instead of only to tests in the island Continent. The second match of the tour was against M.C.C. and ground at Lords. It happened that the M.C.C. team wap & particularly strong one, virtually an allEngland eleven—"W.G.," who captained it, described it as "one of the strongest batting and bowling teams in England, or anywhere else." Getting away from the cold winds at Nottingham, the Australians put in three days of hard practice before the M.C.C. match. After heavy rain thp wicket was bad, but until the game actually started England still rested secure in her belief in the invincibility of her players. In less than five hours her eyes were opened. M.C.C. went in first, and opened with Grace and the redoubtable A. N. Hornby. F. E. Allan —"the, bowler ,of a century," he haa been described, but he was not as successful on English wickets as lie was on Australian—got Grace caught when the great bastman had made only four runs. Hornby reached 10 before Spofforth bowled him, but no other man on the M.C.C. side could even half-master the bowling of Spofforth and Boyle, and soon the innings was finished, at 33! Spoil'orth got six for 4, and Boyle three for 14. Then Morley and Shaw, the greatest two bowlers in Etigland in' their' day, and both of Nottinghamshire— Morley was a very fast left-hander, breaking both ways, and Shaw was-also a fast left-hander, with a remarkably quick action and a fine ofT-break—-mowed down the Australian - wickets, Midwinter being the only man to reach double figures. But the "Cornstalks" managed to top the Englishmen' score by eight runs, Shaw took five for 10, and Morley five for 31. M.C.C.'s second innings was a sad procession. Grace was bowled by Spofforth for a "duck," Hornby got only a single before Boyie bowled him, the next three men did not get. a run. To cut the story short, M.C'.C. seoretl only 1!), and W. Flowers made 11 of those runs. Boyle finished up with five wickets for three runs, and Spofforth with five for 10, All the wickets but one were clean-bowled. Australia hit off the 12 runs required for a win, with a loss of one wicket. The next time that an Australian • eleven weiit to England—in 1880—a test match was included in the team's programme.

SOME OTHER STORIES. 'There were two or three other incidents in the tour of that teilm of 1878 that are worth recalling as curiosities of the game. lit the match between the Australians and Nottinghamshire, already alluded to, W. Midwinter wcilt in first in the Australians' second innings, and carried «iit his bat with a score of 10, made in three hours! At ope time he was at the wickets for an hour and a-half for three runs. Yet Midwinter —he was a Gloucestershire man by birth and a Victorian by adoption—was a very tall man who could hit very hard. Glancing through the records of the tour one notes that in a mateh 'against an 18 of Elland, at Leeds, Boyla took seven wickets in eight balls. Hero is another curiosity of the tour, as noted by F. S. Ashley-Cooper in his "Curiosities of First-class Cricket": —"Players of England v. Australians, at the Oval, September 2 arid 3. E. Barratt obtained all 16 , "'->kets in the latter's first innings at a cost of 43 runs, and,,curiouflly enough, not one of the wickets was clean bowled. In the first- innings, of the Australians the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh wickets all fell "At 50, and in the first innings of the Players the third, fourth, fifth, and Biith fell to Spofforth with the score of 69. There were seven ducks in the first innings of tk'e Australians and six in that of the Players." The Australia j[OR tiurt nw,tck bj eigW ruafr