CRICKET

Grey River Argus, 21 May 1938, Page 9

CRICKET

JACK HOBBS OPPOSES EIGHTBALL OVER.

Will England adopt the eight-ball over? Sir Pelham Warner is in favour of the change, but Jack Hobbs is not.

"I have always respected Sir Pelham Warner’s views cat cricket,” ne writes in "The Cricketer,” “and have rarely been at variance'' with them. In the case of the eight-ball over, however, experience leads me to' disagree with his opinion that it would benefit the game in England.

“Sir Pelham, has gone carefully into the statistics,” proceeds Jack Hobbs, "and finds that an eight-ball over saves, roughly, 20 minutes a day. It is falacious to conclude from this that any more progress is made with a match. “When the idea was first tried in Australia, Jack Gregory used to nurse himself for a couple of deliveries every over. I have seen many otner fast bowlers do the same. To deliver eight balls in succession is too great a strain on a pace bowler, and it id only natural he should go canny. When tired after the tea interval one finds bowlers resorting to negative tactics, and this has the result of slowing the scoring pace and thus wasting the 20 minutes saved by the longer over.”