Two Sides to Cricket

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20361, 19 July 1934, Page 15

Two Sides to Cricket

A striking: contrast between cricket, conditions in Australia and England was drawn by Mr A. T. Donnelly in a speech at the Christchurch High School Old Boys’ Association dinner last evening. In Australia there was a tense feeling of rivalry, a high pitch of excitement. and of keen partisanship; at Lord’s ail was in keeping with tradition, calmness, restrained applause and the most knowledgeable and fairest gathering o„f cricket enthusiasts in the world. It was, he said, most refreshing after the severity of Australia. lie drew a picture of the Sydney Cricket Ground during the second Test of 1933, with 70,000 people packed in it from 6 a.m. and the temperature 100 degrees in the shade. Maurice Levland had told him of hearing one Australian barracker remark: “ Blimey. I got me lunch and a bottle of beer between me feet and T can’t get at it.” Victor Trumper had received a letter from a barracker stating that the writer did not know the members of the Board of Control, but would ! Trumper arrange to have them parade round the ground “ within orange range.” On the other hand was a picture of Lords in 1930 with old cricket enthusiasts leaving the ground while Bradman was piling up his centuries to visit the Long Room of the Club to gaze on the picture of W. G. Grace “having a bracer.” It did not matter who won the present Tests, he said, so long as they were played as a game and not as a war.