UNLIMITED TESTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 145, 21 June 1926, Page 7

UNLIMITED TESTS.

WOULD KILL CRICKET.

ENGLISH POINT OF VIEW.

POLICY OF FORCING A WIN."

('By Cable.—Press Association.— Copyright.)

(Received 10.30 a.m.)

LONDON, June 20.

The "Observer," recalling a paragraph in "Lillywhite's Annual, of 1582," that unconsciously, and perhaps without suspicion, the Australians had seriously and perceptibly aggravated symptoms of the commercial spirit in cricket, declares that the suggestion still holds. "The visitors have never attempted to disguise their paramount interest in the gate returns. The increasing tendency of the last twenty years is to only regard tours in two aspects—a crusade for the defeat of England, and a commercial proposition. They have never understood, nor appreciated, the importance England attaches to the county championships. If international cricket ceased we would be woefully the poorer, but if county cricket lost its grip cricket would quickly die. Lengthening the matches by a single day is one thing; unlimited extension is another. We have suffered enough from the influence of the Australians' unlimited cricket (in Australia) upon our leading players. The time limit is indispensable. The true interests, and delights of the game will be more and more obscured so long as England and Australia are more concerned in avoiding defeats than in forcing a win, if the process advances far enough. A day of reckoning will come, when the public awakens to the fact that the game is really dead, and will seek recreation elsewhere. The whole tendency of modern sport has been to increase the pace. Is cricket alone to deliberately reverse the process?"—(Sydney '-!?un.")

THE AVERAGES

EVERETT A TAIL-END BOWLER

LONDON, June 20. The following are the leading averages of English and Australian cricketers for the season to date: —

JJ.l I. VJIn'gs. Runs. X.O. Avg. Gregory 12 494 G 82.33 Hendry 2 189 0 69.50 Hendren .... 18 828 5 63.69 Sandham 16 924 1 61.60 Richardson .. 10 . 232 6 58.00 Woodfull 13 661 1 55.08 Hardinge ... 14 658 2 54.83 Hearne 12 540 2 54.00 Brown 17 844 1 52.75 Stevens 11 527 1 52.71 Hobbs 16 733 1 52.35 Mead 15 676 2 52.00 Macartney (21st) " 11 433 1 '3.30 BOWLING. Runs. Wkts. Avg. Rhodes 464 46 10.08 Cox 367 34 10.79 Tyldesley 564 49 11.51 Richardson ... 328 28 11.71 Richmond 727 5'> 12.32 Larwood 585 4(> 12.71 Parkin '. 430 34 12.01 Tate 828 81 13.57 Ryan 654 4S i;;.02 Macartney . . . 410 30 13.60 Macaulay .... 735 53 13.86 Everett (last) 20S 0 34.66 — (A. and X.Z.)