AGE IN CRICKET

Greymouth Evening Star, 10 November 1928, Page 9

AGE IN CRICKET

AN OLD MAN’S GAME. Age in cricket is always an interesting subject. Some players grow old rapidly, some retain their youth in regard to quickness of foot and eye after the grey hairs have appeared. For this reason it has been wisely said that a' cricketer is only as old as. he plays, not as old as his birth certificate makes him out to be, writes H. J. Henley, in the “Daily Mail.” Just now our cricket appears to be at the halfway house between youth and middle-age, and it is probable that an eleven selected from men of over 35 would beat the youthsh of under 30. Hobbs, Holmes —the Yorkshire Holmes —Hendren, Woolley,’ Mead. Ernest Tyldosley, Freeman, V. W. C. Jupp, Hardinge, Ducat, Sandham, J. C. White, Russell and Astill, not to mention the unending Rhodes, are only a tow of those who are ahead of the younger generation if averages have any significance. And Barnes and Parkin, l am told are bowling as well as ever in. Lancashire League cricket. There are, of course, a. number of youngsters knocking at the door, as il were. For instance, there stand out prominently several University players. some of whom were chosen to nlay for the Gentlemen —A. M. Crawley. for example, who has the Crawley eyo and the Crawley courage, to the extent of keeping up the traditions of a famous cricketing family. Bitt in these days comparatively few amateurs of the public schools and the universities have sufficient time to spare for first-class cricket after their period of education is over, and the young professionals seem slower than oi old to develop—even if they develop at all!

It is the fashion these days to hear of the players nearly thirty years old described as “young and promising.” But only in exceptional cases has a batsman or a bowler who has failed Io obtain regular place in a county I earn before ho has reached the age

of 25, at the outside, won fame as a Test match player, or even as a county player of above the average. W. G. .Grace played *for the Gentlemen .before he was seventeen. He, it must be said, was a phenomenon. But. others won their spurs in Test matches before they were far advanced in the twenties. . J. W. Hearne made his first hundred for England against Australia on an Australian ground before he had reached his majority. Tom Hayward was no more than tiventy-five when he was picked for England. And A. C. MacLaren, F. S. Jackson, Lohmann, F. R. Foster, among a hundred others, had already established their claim to”-lasting fame at. an age now known as “young and promising.” Why is it, then,’ that our presentday players are so slow off the mark, to borrow a term from the running track? Some people blame the war. But boys of eighteen, whop the war ended, are twenty-eight years, of age now. which has left a big margin for “development experience,” about which wo hear so much.. Others blame the iucommtax —fathers cannot afford to let their sons play cricket all the time in these days. Others say that the young professionals, those, who hii.vo still to gain a. pla.ee in thd first eleven, arc so poorly paid that it is net worth their while- for anyone with a. tyade or a clerkship to try to bo coiinty . cricketer. . ’Those are the suggestions. . It is all something of . a mystery. I. am still waiting for an answer. And aren’t we all? ■ ■ -