WICKET OR PITCH?

New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 401, 28 February 1947, Page 5

WICKET OR PITCH?

Sir,-Your correspondent, R. Pape, finds it impossible to mow his wicket. He should try the one defined in the Oxford University’s monumental New English Dictionary as "the ground between and about the wicket; the pitch," or even Chambers’ Twentieth Century Dictionary’s "the ground where the wickets are placed."’ :

"MOW ME DOWN"

(Wellington).

Sir-Mr. Pape’s insistence that the wicket be called the "pitch" has interesting implications. Such pedantry would mean that the ball would "pitch on the pitch"; that the gentleman who fields at right angles on the leg side would have a "square" leg; that his team mate in the long field a "long" leg and another a "fine" leg. When Mr. Bedser or Mr. Wright "bowled a maiden over" might we expect a resulting charge of criminal assault? Would a "glance to leg" have anything to do w.th short skirts? When Mr. Hammond "places the field" might we expect to see the English captain grasping handfuls of the Sydney Cricket Ground or the Basin Reserve and distributing them according to his whim and would a "hook to lee" be a fish story?

R. B.

M.

(Tawa Flat).

Sir-It does not seem to have occurred to correspondents who have been discussing this matter, to refer to the dictionary. In the Oxford Pocket Dictionary I find: "Wicket (cricket): three stumps with bails in position: state of "ground between the wickets (e.g., a soft wicket)." According to the O.E.D. therefore "wicket" is not synonymous with pitch, but can refer to the ground in snecial phrases.

QUIDNUNC

(Dunedin).