THE CROWD AND ITS CRICKET

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 70, 16 December 1929, Page 9

THE CROWD AND ITS CRICKET

SIDELIGHTS AT THE BASIN RESERVE UNREHEARSED INCIDENTS OF THE DAY’S PLAY THE DRESS THAT TOOK A WICKET (By E.A.AJ The vast open spaces of the Reserve looked green and smooth. Microscopic stumps set in the midst gave to the place an atmosphere of enormous size. Already a good few of the record-break-ing crowd, some twelve thousand strong, had spread a margin of black round the periphery, stippled with the dots of distant faces. A red hat, a colourful summer dress dotted here and there, but particularly the red hat, gave relief to the sombre hues of massed humanity all busily talking. A hush fell upon the talkers and a band of men dressed in white appeared upon the greenness of the grass. In silence’ the crowd permitted them to spread themselves out about the Reserve. Two men of Wellington came in to bat. After a tremendous run, Nichols catapulted a ball at one of the batsmen. The afternoon play had started. The delivery of the first ball after a break in a game of cricket is a moment on the Part of the spectators, watching the home side bat, not for talk, but almost for prayer. For some psychological reason that first ball is expected to clean bowl the luckless batsman. The crowd, during its delivery, got ready with its gasp—a gasp more full of meaning than the best and biggest amplified “talkie”, gasp ever put across a theatre. The ceremony of the first ball and the fact that Airey snicked a single to leg in the first over broke the tension. The crowd could now' spare time to talk. Identification Problems. Unlike dirt-track racing, dog shows, football matches, picture galleries, or baseball, the game of Cricket has never tolerated any efforts to make the distinguishing of its players a matter of simplicity- For this reason the first hour of Saturday’s match became to many a bewildering game of “who’s who.” “Ought to have numbers on them; takes all the time to sort them out—who’s that there by the bowler-no, not the umpire—mid-on do you call it—look, dear, in the programme and see if Gilligan plays mid-on —what I it says he’s a fine fieldsman at cover point —perhaps they’ve moved him round a bit—here’s a picture of him—only half of him you say—well, there, how is one to tell.” “Excuse me,” says someone anxious to borrow another pair of eyes. “Does the scoreboard say N-i-c what is bowling—yes, page three, Nichols, born October 6, 1900—well, now, you don’t say—what really fast, and when he hits he hurts—no, he doesn’t look that sort of fellow—dear, dear me, when your Uncle Adolphus played the game they never dreamed of saying nasty things like that —how things change, even cricket.” So the four-hour Saturday afternoon chapter of the match gets into its stride. Gradually the mysteries of the score-board are revealed to those who, thanks to magnificent eyesight, are able to read it. But why, if they give two nice little stars, so reminiscent of whisky, to the batsmen, cannot they do the same for the man of the moment —the bowler? As it is, Woolley and Nichols, Barratt and Worthington, and a good few others would be surprised if they could only listen to a deplorable list of mistaken identities during the first hour. So the game moves on with the full OTAGO TEAM TO PLAY AUCKLAND. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Dunedin, December 14. Moloney replaces Jacobs in the Otago cricket team to play Auckland. SYDNEY GRADE MATCHES (Rec. December 15, 5.5 p.m.) Sydney, December 15. In grade cricket matches yesterday, playing for Waverley against North Sydnejj Wendle Bill made 146 not out; for Mosman against University Love made 119 and Salmon 95; for St. George against Petersham Palmer made 90 not out. Bowling for Glebe against Balmain, Mair took six wickets for 103; for Randwick against Western Suburbs. McNamee took five for 4S and McGrath three for 6; for Weston Suburbs Grangel took three for 1; for Northern Districts against Marrickville Chilvers took five for 56.

ELLIMAN’S EMBROCATION banishes aches, pains, sprains, and strains. Athletes prefer it during training aud “after the gam.e”—Advt.

majestic slowness of a home side trying to be very careful. Like petals falling from a flower—a catch here, a wicket there, a run-out, a four, a bye, a stolen one, or a missed catch—mark the passing of time. “Watch Woolley!” A man taps me on the shoulder. “You watch Woolley!” he says mysteriously, the air becomes charged with sinister feelings. I watch Woolley until the poor fellow, one would think, must start to blush. He lollops up to the wicket and spins a deceptive shrewd ball at the batsman, -who, obviously, is frightened of things it may but doesn’t do and so misses it. “Well?” I ask. “All no-balls—every one of them. Umpire must be asleep—asleep I say.” It seems terrible. Umpires sleeping at their stumps should be shot like sentriesAnother man caught my eye. “Keep your eye on Nichols’s legs—every one of them no-balls,” he said with conviction. Apart from the grammatical, insinuations about Nichols’s legs, it is evident that somebody ought to be told about it. But the game goes on. In spite of the fact that experts in the crowd that line the boundaries discover terrible flaws in everything. But then that, of course, is cricket. At football, the “ref.” is told all about it out of hand. It.takes something more than Nichols’s legs to move a cricket crowd. Even the morning incident of the dislodged bail did not have the terrific effect it would have had if it had occurred at football—if it could. But that is another story. “No-ball!” shouts the umpire as if he had heard those dark and sinister undercurrents of the crowd. “Ha—l told you so; just woken up—pfhzz.” McLeod calls for a run; James obediently runs—swish goes the bails—and James does not Stop till the pavilion—run out. “Excuse me,” says someone in the small of my back, “but the ball is dead after a no-ball—now could he be run out?” “Dead as a door nail.” someone else confirms. “Look at page five of the programme,” says another voice. We all look. But page, five does no more than suggest, rather tactlessly, to the batsman how to get out in no less than ten well-tried ways, all perfectly legal. This programme, though, is encyclopaedic in its possibilities. Quite by luck I turned up page 25. “Look,” I said, “at page 25.” We look. “A batsman,” it says, “may be ... quite a lot of things, ending with “he may not be out off a no-ball.” Yes, so far so good. Why not win the match by running the required total?—“unless run out, hitting the ball twice, handling the ball, or obstructing the field.” No-balls are evidently very, very deadly things and the less said about them the better. The Solitary Highlight. So the game goes on. One catches a curious infection from goodness knows where that something is just going to happen. People who come to look because their husbands are .so fond of cricket begin to take an interest in the immediate future. They clap when Wellington passes the score of the M.C.O. Although a little aloof at first, now they would be ready to burst into unrestrained joy if Henderson could only make his hundred. “He’s made nearly thirty now,” they whisper to one another, afraid that their suggestion may affect his luck. Even the trams develop a curiously slow gait as they sauntered past. A dog wanders on to the sacred precincts of the deep field. A crowd of boys are shoved from the screen, and a woman in what to a mere man looked like a dressing gown, with huge red caterpillars crawling up it, appears on the scene. Simultaneously Badcock gets caught. The coincidence is significant, but there is nothing against it on the official programme. . Someone behind me is talking of Rotorua. “No, you don’t wear costumes in the hot baths there—not allowed. There was once a girl who jumped into the ladies’ bath there, and when she was in the water she . . . Gee! they sc !” But I never knew what happened in that hot bathing pool at Rotorua. Henderson most thoughtlessly chose that very moment to send a catch to Allom. Allom more thoughtlessly caught it. There was a burst of applause. Not so much for the catch, but for Henderson’s splendid effort and the match generally. Not long after, some twelve or fourteen thousand people decided simultaneously that it was time to go, and tried to do so, in squads a thousand strong. The Second Chapter.

An hour afterwards all that could be seen on the vast open spaces of the Basin Reserve was a few patient starling? pecking about for their muchdelayed evening meal. Whether scratching for runs encourages the worm to come to the surface is a problem that has nothing whatsoever to do with cricket Anyhow, what had been the crowd decided, as individuals over their evening meal, that their entrance money had not been mis-spent. “I’d go again,” said one football fan, “if Monday was another Saturday.”