THE SECOND TEST

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 35, 10 August 1921, Page 9

THE SECOND TEST

ANOTHER MYSTERY

SOLVED

[TRUE BATTING FORM

Writing of the second Test cricket match, the special correspondent'in London of Sydney Sun says:—

We continue to learn the truth about this Australian team, and the last. instalment of the serial is not less satis-, tying than those which ' went before. They are always reassuring their friends and confounding their critics; but they have never been quite so convincing as they were in the" second innings of the second Test match.

It must be' admitted that certain doubts and fears were felt by^some who had watched them closely; and had woni dered what sort of figure the batsmen would cut when they were asked, to play for keeps. To justify these doubts and fears it is necessary to hark back to that curious atmosphere o! mystery in which the team has moved, and which has never been quite absent from their batting and bowling performances. . This cannot be said of their fielding, because it has been consistently keen and excel] lent One question after another has been set them, and they have always answered more or less satisfactorily. But they have done no more. Their responses have been a model of brevity in the true laconic manner. Some of us had hoped they would show their hand; All we got was a card at % time. ' One day, as at Leydon—this has been said before, but it is worth repeating now—they turned up their fast-bowling card justwhen—or because—some of the critics had said that morning that the fast bowling was a bluff. In the two Lord's matches, against the M.C.C. and Middlesex, the critics discovered flaws in the batsmen's armour. The batsmen replied by knocking the bowling about to the tune of two a minute. Every time a hopeful English voice was raised, in this department or $iat, the team seemed to take a delight in smothering it. So the second Test match came round, and even then we hadn't seen the side " all out to win." , "PLAYING THEMSELVES IN." That the team were wonderful judges of. distance even the most dubious Aus-tralian-over here had come to admit. However badly they started, they got in front before the finish. But they ran it rather close against the M.C.C. What Australian spectators felt that day was that the same self-confidence which had proved such an asset'when the side was in the field was being overdone when it was at the wicket. It might one day be the side's undoing. Later, they beat Middlesex by eight wickets. But the bowlers won that match. It was not Reassuring to see. Australia lose Andrews and Macartney in making a miserable 32 to win. ; •

The whole business looked top risky. Few batsmen, even in the serious matches, had' taken.the trouble to play themselves in. To attack from the jump might pay against some bowling, bat not against all. It became rather worrying when Andrews and' Macartne y' got out in the first innings of this second Test through sheer over-confidence. Durston may not be a true express, but be is respectably fast. / He is fast enough to ■ make his, off-theory worthy of distrust until the. batsmen have been in long enough to get a good eight of the ball. Instead they went for it as much as the oldier school used to keep off it. Some very pretty, wristy square-outs we 6aw— and then the catch at the wicket. But, they were not alone in their disrespect of the cream'of English bowling. Pellew's style has been safer; but he ; too, delight* to make the pace from the jump. Gregory of late ha» constantly made the Australian spectator gasp. In the first innings he tookrisks galore. Taylor took pains to get his eye in; but his health lias not bean good to him, and one could never feel confident that he would get going. t „'.'■■ If this fondness for making the pace was not checked Bardsley and Armstrong might be left with few supporters at a pinch; and Garter's customary . "valuable contribution" is not a certainty. It would be too bad if Nos. 2, 3, 4. 5, arid) 7 got addicted to a'risk as if it were a dirng. One critk said quite truly of the first innings that the Australians batted with an air of "never-saw-such-bowling-in-oux-lrves." . They cejrtainly treated the bowling with a want of respect, and even of courtesy. It was all very satisfactory while it lasted. But it was a trifle too brilliant, and often nrodh too risky to come off always. • . It was not, then, without reason that these doubts and fears perplexed some timorous souls when Australia went in again with only 129 to get to win. But it all came right. Bardsley and An-, idrews did takeHhe trouble ,to play themselves in. They did refrain from taking needless risks. It is trne Bardsley nearly got out with the total at fire by edging Douglas's outswinger—which has a habit of going away "down the hill," fes they say at Lords's from the slope' of the field A It was quite a possible catch for Hendren; and it was exactly the way, Bardsley got out in the first innings. No more of it for Bardsley. He left this ball alone or played it back to Douglas. Better -still, Andrews had had enough of Durston'i off-theory. To'see him let these balls go by -was to know at once that he was there to stay. Thus early it was clear that "Safety First" was to be the game. Perhaps Armstrong had given a word of advice in season.

BOWLING PRESTIGE INJURED. Yet, for sheer ease of scoring, the batting was a new revelation. It did raoro to injure the prestige of the English bowling than the brilliant onslaught of the first innings. ■ The persistency of the I run-getting was the most amazing thing about ft. Slow at first, a run a minute for .three-quarters of an hour, it did | liven up when Andrews and Barsley got. set, because there were more twos and threes. But the scoring went on all the time, gentle placing strokes to the 'blank spaces on the leg-side, but plenty of them. Gone were the full-bodied late-cuts and leg-hits of the one, and the flashing. square-cuts and hooks of the I other. Bardsley, surely, never got so large a proportion of singles from that half-push,, half-glance of his to. backward leg. Andrews got many smart singles from taps toward the covers, but more from leisurely pushes between square-leg and mid-ofi. ■■■;,,"

The score seldom stood still. Runs came, ever so gently, but with a "steady, unceasing flow. Scarce a stroke was worth a cheer. But it was terribly sure, irresistible, like a slowly-rising flood. On the Saturday, if the bowling was made to look small, the batsmen did give it a sporting chance. They so often looked like getting themselves out. On the Tuesday the bowling was really better, especially Parkin's. But it waa made to look smaller still; because the batsmen had made up their minds to keep themselves in. Strokes that left the grass could be counted on the fingers of one hand. The lure of the boundary ropes was gone. Bardsley and Andrews might have been batting upon tb.o unfenced plains.

One chivractprislic of the Australians few ta£rcs»d a iiwamiog jsdga em

here, (heir quite remarkable skill in giv-f ing its yalne to each (stroke, whether from their own bats or their opponents'. In the field they seem to know exactly whether or not a run can be aaved; though, to do them justice, they moatiy decide in the affirmative. At the wicket Andrews and Bardsloy made their short runs with a precision bom of entire selfpossession. Though they batted thu» quietly, they were masters of the situation, and well knew it. Some of the singles were of the tip-and-run, order, but not many. More often them came off ' strokes .which went jnst where the batsmen intended; if they were not assessed at two runs, well, the batsmen walked, LESSON, OF SECOND TEST. - Thus, if the .batting :lacked the audacity of the first innings, it dominate* the bowling no less completely. - : The same assurance, the same conviction of superiority, were there, but really more impressive and more relentless becausa ' they ran on safe lines. This was a phase of the Australian, batting never before seen 'during ■ this' tour. Atk£ wSiiJe ■ the English are taking heart—and rightly .60—from- such baiting a* Woolley'ss, Tennyson's, and Dipper a, ' the j»triotic Australian cams away from Lord's and from seeing this Bard«ley-Andrews partnership -with a pretty firm conviction that their sida has a trick worth two of that. It is acurious reversal of form, after all we ' heard laet winter of the doggedness, dourness, patience, and what-not of Australian Dotting that w« should Have tor wait thus long for the batsmen to sacrifice brilliance for soundness, and then, get it at 131 runs in 100 minutes.

•■' For; tnis is the real lesson of the second Test'; that "while England seems on the way to getting the batsmen she wants,. Australia has given the most convincingl exhibition' of her batting to date. The brilliant displays of other, matches—to-day's 700 against Hampshire, for instances-may be ignored in the light of the Australians' second -.innings last Tuesday.. .. .-; .:,:■;:

We were told the other day that what England ■■< wanted - was all-rounders. Now, everybody . seems to be talking of batsmen.; and we hear next to nothing of howlers. The reason is that the theory that English batsmen stand in awe or terror of Armstrong, Gregory, and -M'l)onald is still •orthodox' oreed. If this .is all they want, they seem to have discovered two of the re-, quired type in Dipper and Tennyson. Dipper engages in agricultural pursuits whidh havte left an impression upon, his batting. He hits a straight ball a* , if he were mowing the pitch. But the stoke gets him runs, and might well puzzle a bowler who does not expect, the straight ball to be drive^n inevitably to the on-side. He has, too, the temperament—or lack of it—which is said to be necessary against the Australian bowlers. He lacks reverence. Both* these batsmen are sure enough for the third Test. Tennyson fully justifies has place. He "fears no fbe"; but his might n3ve been out any time before > he fotina the pace of the fast bowlers. But we have still to see; Armstrong hit. Ths critics still din this into the ears, of the English batsmen, but we have '■ not seen it' tried yet. One day, the duel between Tennyson, and Armstrong will be worth seeing. . '