INCORRECTLY NAMED?

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21197, 22 June 1934, Page 9

INCORRECTLY NAMED?

•10 THE EDITOK OF THE I'RESS. Sir,—l was sorry to Fee your subleader this morning headed "The Body-Line Controversy."' "Body-line" bowling is the term coined by the Australian papers with the object, of course, of making out that Larwood did nothing but bowl at the batsmen's body. It is not necessary to stress the fact that more than one of the Australians hit up good scores off Larwood, but I would like to point out that the leg theory or leg trap is not new. When Badccck, who coached in Wellington and Dunedin, came out, he used the leg theory with all his men on the leg side, and he tried it for a time in the last match, Otago , v. Canterbury. And bowling himself' he was at times successful, but he was not a fast trundlcr. Early in' this controversy it was pointed out that in past times the Englishmen have received some nasty knocks from Australian bowlers, but they did not "squeal." But my main object in writing is to suggest that New Zealand papers should not assist the Australian sensational section of the press to keep alive a wrong impression of Larwood's bowling by giving it a name of their own for the purpose of leading people to believe that the ball is aimed at their bodies. For that is what they wished their readers to infer. At the time, as was reported, the Marylebone Cricket Club cabled to the Australian Board of Control stating that any implication that Larwood made a direct attack on the batsmen was improper and incorrect. And Warner, as reported in your cable news yesterday, in referring to the captain of the Notts team, says that Carr "knows perfectly well the difference between leg theory and 'what the Australians call body-line.'" Perhaps the term "body-line" has been used in the press unthinkingly, but I would like to see the reputable ' press of this country sticking to the proper term "leg theory" or "leg ' trap" when referring to Larwood's bowling and thus assist to prevent prejudice and ill-feeling.—Yours, etc., JUSTICE. June 20, 1934.