SPORTING.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 386, 18 March 1937, Page 2

SPORTING.

“Googlies” and “Lobs.” Two interesting cricket personalities recently passed away in G. H. Simpson-Hayward and B. J. T. Bosanquet (writes “Old Sport” in the March issue of The Australian Journal). The former was the last of the underarm bowlers; the latter, the first of the googlies. It might be news to many of the younger generation of cricket enthusiasts to know that underarms were bowled in test matches as recently as 1910-11, but Simpson-Hay-ward's “lob” bowling had a great deal to do with the victories of the English team in, South Africa that saason. Occasionally we hear of a desperate bowler resorting to underarms in an endeavour to break up a long partnership, or to shift some obstinate stonewalTer, but Simpson-Hayward —who was captain of Worcestershire, and a good bat into the bargain—habitually bowled in this fashion, and invariably secured a good crop of wickets through the season. He imparted terrifle! spin to the ball, and could break either way at will. As he played in county cricket for many years, English spectators were accustomed to seeing him in action, and took his bowling as a matter of course —as they had taken the underarm bowling of D. L. A. Jephson, captain of Surrey,. 1899-1904, and Walter Humphreys (Sussex). But when he appeared in Africa the crowds at Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town roared with laughter. Their mirth soon died away when they found their best batsmen, players of the calibre of H. W. Taylor, A. D. Nourse, G. A. Faulkner, Gordon White, L. Strickerand J. W. Zuleh, falling victims to his wiles. If Simpson-Hayward was the last of his race, so Bosanquet was the first man to exploit the modern “googlie.” Nowadays any slow bowler is classed by the crowd as a “googlie,” but in reality this fantastic designation should be a'pplied only to bowlers who can deliver off-breaks or legbreaks with no apparent change of action. In the course of a comparatively short career—he was born in 1875 and retired when he was 33'—Bosanquet revolutionised bowling, and caused a marked alteration in the style of batting. Always a first-rate batsman, originally he bowled fast, but by experimenting with the slow stuff, he suddenly developed the knack of bowling a ball which, although to all intents and purposes a leg-break, suddenly confounded the batsman by turning the wrong way. Before that/ by watching a bowler’s hand and action as he ran up to deliver the ball, a class batsman could tell whether he would have to play an off-break, a legbreak, or a straight one; but it was no use watching Bosanquet, for quite frequently that bowler himself did not know what the ball would do when it pitched. He was nothing if not erratic, and was sometimes guilty of sending down over after over of stuff that a schoolboy could hit for four. At the same time, so queer a game is cricket, that some of. his worst balls took wickets. On one occasion he got Norman Claxton, the South Australian, caught by Strudwick behind the wicket off a ball that bounced three times, and was well wide of the wicket. The president of the Middlesex Cricket Club, on seeing Bosanquet bowl for the first time, protested to Warner, the captain, against putting on a man who sent down such deplorable rubbish, but Warner was not to be dissuadded, and later had the pleasure ot leading England in a test match in Sydney in 1904, when Bosanquet, by taking six, wickets for 51 runs, helped materially to win the

rubber and the “Ashes.” The South Africans took up the new style of bowling enthusiastically, finding it effective on their matting wickets, but Australia’s first real “googlie” bowler was Dr. H. V. Hordern, of Sydney, who was tremendously effective, just before the War. Then came Mailey and Grimmett, and now FleetwoodSmith, who provides a new and even more devastating form of attack by bowling his “googlies” left-handed.