Cricket Without the Glory

New Zealand Listener, Volume 28, Issue 716, 2 April 1953, Page 4

Cricket Without the Glory

HE cricket season now ending has been remarkable for the amount of emotional disturbance on the fringe of the game. It is not unusual in this country for players to be frustrated by bad weather; and perhaps we are so used to poor summers that it seemed better to make no: excuses of that sort when a New Zealand team failed against South Africa. After all, the Plunket Shield series had been completed, so that the best players had had some opportunity to show what they could do. But judgment was passed in the earlier part of the season. Long before the arrival of the South Africans, _the nation was being told in its newspapers that New Zealand cricket was in "the doldrums." The chances of our team were examined fully and with the utmost pessimism. If ever a side was encouraged to take the field with the conviction that it was bound to fail, it was certainly the team which met the South Africans for the first Test in Wellington. Not surprisingly, the weight of the occasion proved too much for it. A cry then arose that something should be done to restore the country’s shattered fortunes: the people were reminded that a New Zealand team was shortly to tour South Africa, and that good players must. be found somewhere. Similar comment was heard after the second Test. A player for Central Districts made a _ century against the South Africans, and critics began to see the early light of a better day. They were able to forget that the same optimism --expressed with proper reservehad been felt after the Canterbury game, when Chapple had played his way into the second Test, only to succumb on that occasion to the atmosphere which oppressed his fellows. Meanwhile performances were analysed; some men were "certainties" for the South African tour on Monday, and well on the way out by Tuesday. Citizens wrote indignantly to newspapers, pointing out that spectators found the money for overseas tours, and were therefore entitled to brighter

cricket. It was a festival of opinion -enlivened by some booing in Auckland-which made some of us wish that nobody had ever thought of test matches. Cricket is a game good to play and watch; but it is only a game, and the quickest way to kill it is to turn it into a contest weighed down by. international prestige and rivalry. When nations are playing, instead of teams, the purpose of a bowler seems to be everything except to hit a wicket; and batsmen, encountering such oddities as "dry" balls, become defensive and timid. Every move is described for listeners; and next day the successes and failures are studied in newspapers. If a batsman is too cautious, he is severely criticised; if he snicks a fast one, and is caught in the slips, he is blamed for throwing away his wicket. There is sometimes a "chanceless" innings in big cricket; but the batsman who never takes a chance will have very little fun; and it is hard not to believe that fun is still one of the reasons for playing games. Cricket is becoming scientific. The commentators now use terms which are beginning to sound very like jargon-the verbal parasite that so often goes with scientific progress. Yet it is idle to ask for yesterday. New Zealand is in international cricket, for better or worse; and we can argue in vain that players would do better if they were given less attention. When cricket is a little more than a game it is not a science, but an art; and art should never be separated from joyfulness. A hardfought match is a joy to play in, and a joy to watch if it can be understood that the chances and wilful risks are all in the tussle. Afterwards, however, it should be like the sunlight fading from the grass, or the bouquet of a remembered wine. The paradox in our present situation is that we are crying out for a return to carefree cricket, and at the same time are insisting on conditions -the big game, the statistics, the publicity and the inquest — which make it impossible.