CRICKET

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXIII, Issue 12075, 14 October 1933, Page 11

CRICKET

TIME-LIMIT CRICKET

“Will time-limit, knock-out competition cricket sweep South Wales?” asks an English paper. “Tune-limit cricket has long been successful in Various parts of England—a final at Leicester recently attraiied over 5,000 spectators —and although it has only recently been introduced in South Wales,-it promises to transform lukewarm followers of cricket into redhot enthusiasts. 'ln -Swansea- timelimit cricket has become’ so popular that games between local clubs arc attracting larger crowds than county matches -do, and some remarkable batting andl bowling performances aro being achieved. Some batsmen have been scoring at an average rate of 90 runs -an hour, while bowlers have been knocking wickets down so easily that their averages show more wickets than runs. Shrewd judges believo that time-limit competition games will be played in every big town in South. Wales next -season, ’’ CROMB AND LEG-TIIEORY Wrijting to a .friend in Christchurch, I. B. Cromb -says that recently he had to -play leg-theory bowling, with eight fieldsmen on the leg-side, thrice in Lancashire League cricket, -and in three innings he scored 57, 7S, and 87 not out. Cromb has ideas about the footwork needed for batting against such bowling, and lie thinks that bis iscores against it confirm his idea. However, he does not state the pace of the leg-theory bowling he played in these three innings, nor does he say whether it was ordinary leg-* theory or Body] i no- bowling. In one of the three innings he had to play Iff N. 'Constantine’s bowling—fast, but not so fast as Larwood’s— but it can be said quite confidently that Cromb’s experienco does not make any material contribution to the controversy about- bodyline bowling.

NEXT TOUR BY AUSTRALIANS

M..C.C. BOWLING PROBLEMS

The question on the lips of many cricketers just now, (writes Neville Cardius) is precisely the same question they were asking this time lastyear: Where are the bowlers to get Bradman and Wood full out? It is almost certain, after all, an Australian team will visit us next year, and it is almost certain that there will be no Larwood and no fast logtheory of the kind to which the Australians (and the majority of English cricketers now) have taken exception.

Therefore, tlie Bradman problem remains exactly where it was twelve months ago—save that Bradman is to-day a greater batsman than .ever he was. Everybody who saw him in Australia last winter agreed that his stroke play is incomparably the best in. the game. “Had Larwood not bowled! his 'theory' Bradman would have scored anywhere he liked and as many as he liked.’ That is the opinion of most judges of the game who saw Bradman last winter.

Clark is, as far as I can see, our only bowler who can he said to stand a dog’s chance against Bradman. On “sticky” wickets of course, we would find spin howlers enough to give Bradman and his countrymen severe trouble. But on “sticky” wickets O’Reilly and Ironmonger might easily prove as nasty a combination as anything that we could discover. And anyhow, our English summers have changed; they aro going to be dry and warm and Australian for sever, al years to. come!

The next England team will more or less havo to be chosen from the following resources: Sutcliffe, Bakewell, Jardine, Ames, Keeton, James Langridge, Iddon, Nichols, Pataudi, Verity, Barnett, C. S. Marriott, Bowes, and Clark. Next year other comets may swim into our ken; if they do not the Australians will begin even favourites, so to say. As a lover of the game who is compelled to watch many cricket matches in thp North of England, I would like to touch on the point of the slow scoring that invariably is witnessed at Old Trafford 1 , and not only when Lancashire are batting. Nearly everyone of Lancashire’s opponents, 5n fact, havo this year failed to score at OR] Trafford at a consistent speed of 55 to 60 runs an hour. Enormities of stonewalling have been committed! By Sussex and Gloucestershire, of all counties. There is a feeling going around Old Trafford that visiting counties are deliberately paying out Lancashire for old! and long-drawn iScores. Something clearly 1 has been “happening” in many matches this year at Old Trafford. Lancashire have in the majority of their engagements scored at a quicker pace than their opponents. Perhaps Lancashire’s bowling has had “something to do” with the trouble. It is .not deadly bowling, tr.ue; but no bowling in the land Is cleverer than Lancashire’s at keeping the runs,down. As I write, Lancashire have lost only one match and won fewer than Derbyshire.

Has tlio term “the rough stuff” reached the South of England yet’? Do. left-arm bowlers- at Hove and Portsmouth howl over the wicket and pitch the hall outside the leg stump—just outside it, with their field .set accordingly?

Protective howling is reasonably employed when you are compelled to work to save the rnatJpL But Lancashire seem occasionally to howl protectively ,simply to stop thp other sid’e from .winning. It is mot a policy that is likely to encourage visitors to Old) Trafford to play what is known as “sporting” cricket