"THAT'S CRICKET."

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19744, 17 September 1927, Page 1 (Supplement)

"THAT'S CRICKET."

BRIGHTENING THE GAME.

BY MATAN'GA.

Lord Hawke's comment on our players' rate ol scoring at Scarborough, in the final match of the British visit, cuts both ways. It is both praise for our men's methods and condemnation for those followed by Mr. Leveson Gower's team. "Our fellows' 170 runs for the afternoon is ridiculous," is Lord Hawke's criticism ; "Your fellows' 394 for five wickets is cricket."

This comment has application beyond Scarborough and the particular match played there. In struggling to avert a follow-on and taking two hours to compile 97. Douglas and F. W. Gillican were using tactics with which English county cricket has lately become regrettably familiar in aimost all circumstances. Whether the particular system of award mg points in the competition or the care taken by professionals to safeguard their batting records is responsible, the fact is admitted and deplored.

It is not that skill has deteriorated. It certainly has not. There are as many first-class batsmen in the Old Land as ever there were England's winning back the ashes, from Australia was not an accident. The skill is there in abundance. But the spirit has changed. Caution is at an unwarranted premium. So county cricket has gone down,, not in the standard of play, but in the style of play. Defensive tactics have been cultivated at the expense of dash: and public interest has sagged a good deal Instead of attending cricket matches, folk write letters to the papers explaining why they do not go; and even leading players have joined in the chorus of regret and disapproval. Playing the Game. Into this heavy atmosphere the New Zealanders' more spirited methods came as an awakening breeze. Perhaps they were able to do this better because they had no reputation to lose. A reputation can be a great nuisance. Perhaps they merely manifested a care-free temperament more characteristic of this Dominion than of the Old Land. Whatever the explanation, as batsmen they showed a liking to get busy early, and their pluck was so often rewarded that soon even the knowalls had to admit there was something in playing a game as a game, and not as a business.

Of course, cricket is not a game for blind recklessness. Batting calls for defence as well as aggression; but, as every cricketer of experience knows, the aggressive element is always present in good batting, even in back play. Ihe way in which a stroke may cbmbine defence and attack is one of the secrets to be learned by all who would become highscoring batsmen. Old W.G. had learned it. Lord Hawke himself has been a splendid exponent of the art of running out to meet a ball ot dangerous length and so to play it with greater safety and greater aggressiveness at once. Ranjitsinghi. prince of batsmen as well as of an Indian province, preached and practised the same thing. For some undiscovered reason," he said, there is a floating idea that running out and rashness are synonymous. As a matter ot fact, to run out is often the safest thing one can do. It makes a difficult ball into an easy one, and often enables the batsman to make a forcing stroke. . . . lne man who plays cautiously • • • • ties himself into extraordinary knots by playing what he considers a safe game, when the only safe course is to play a dashing game." Combining Attack With Defence.

It must be owned, however, that aggresBion does involve risks, though they are bv no means as great as they sometimes* appear to be. But whr not take risks? Nothing venture, nothing win. There are times when nothing but digging in, without thought of scoring, is a man's duty, in the circumstances. But these times are rare and obvious. Playing in is as justifiable as digging in, but the time for it passeß in a few overs. A batsman's chief duty is ta.make runs. If he acts as if it were to keep other batsmen from having an innings, he should be given the choice of giving up the notion or giving up the game. In recent years the bat's triumph over the ball has been the occasion of vexed discussion. Various proposals have been mooted and some of them tried t larger wicket, smaller bat, smaller ball, over of eight balls instead of six. Perhaps where these are bound to fail, there might sue ceed, as a means of brightening cricket, a rule declaring a batsman out if he fails to' make a minimum total of runs in a given time. That would ewn-up the chances of the ball, though "its framing would need care.

Nothing, however, is a fraction as good as the regaining of a spirit af enterprise by the batsman." He will make runs—probably, on the average, more runs; but there will come back the thrill of Expectancy that the nAt stroke may see him caught in the Song field or Host* up off a" mis-hit Bowlers will not mind being banged for an occasional fix if by that means the batsman may be lured into having a go at " the wrong 'un." The batsman's stay at the wickets would not last, on the average, so long; but there is a likelihood that his batting aggregate for the season would be greater, and anyway ho would have the satisfaction of his own zestful moments and his recollection that he had added to the gaiety of a game, both for participants and onlookers. The Zest of the Struggle. Listen again to E. V. Lucas, his song of the cricket ball. It is full of the eager spirit of a great game.

Leather the heart o me; leather—the rind o' ir.e O but the soul of me's other than that! Else, should 1 thrill as I <io so exultingly, C imbiug the air from the thick o' the bat? Leatl r<- the heart o' me: ay. but in verity Kindred 1 claim with the sun in the sky Elerces. bow all to the little red ball. And bow to my brother ball blazing on high. Pom on as torrents ot light, pood Sun. Shin? in the hearts of my cricketers, shine; Fili t em with gladness and might, good Sun. Touch them with rlory. O Brother of mine! Brother cf mine. Brother of mine! We are the !ords of them. Brother and Mate. I but a little ball though but a Great Give me the howler whose fingers em bracing me Tin-rle and throb with the icy of the game. One who can laugh at a smack to the boundary, fiinsle of purpose and steady of aim That <» the man for me; striving in sym pathy Our? is a fellowship surf to prevail Willow must fall in the end to the ball See ''fce . tiger " leap for the bail. Give me the fieldsman whose eyes never stray from me Eager to clutch me. a roebuck in pace Perish the unalert pensh the " buttery." Perish the laggard I strip in the race Grand the ecstasy soaring trium phantly. Holding the gaze of the meadow is grand. , , , ~ Grandest of all to the soul of the bail Is the finishing grip of the honest brown hand Give rne the batsman who squanders bis force on me. . Crowdina the strength of his soul in stroke; , . Per>sh the muff and the little tin bhrews bury. Meanly contented to potter er.d pose He wAr-Jd treasure me. he must do doughtily,— Br ••'e.'s and buffeting® stir me like wine. . . , Gian'= come all. do your worst with the ball or later you re mice. sirs, you re mine. " That's cricket." It will be played wherever the bat sings a duet with the ball, both of them full of real cricketing zest.