Page:Cricket, by WG Grace.djvu/254

 Lohmann to-day is equally effective; and it is simply ludicrous to watch batsman after batsman walk into the trap. After the trick was done one could not help saying, "What an absurdly simple ball to have been bowled by!" but, all the same, it was a triumph of the bowler's art.

Try to get some break on the ball. That is the next stage for the young bowler, and must be acquired if he desires to reach the first class. There are times when the wicket is perfection, and straight good-length balls have little effect against a first-rate batsman. He keeps playing them with a straight bat, hoping to tire the bowler out, when loose ones will come and the runs with them. Professional batting is improved all round; but its strongest point is the unwearied patience and strong defence of its finest representatives. If the young bowler thinks he will tire out a Shrewsbury, a Gunn—I shall not say a Scotton—he is hugely mistaken; and if he has nothing but straight good-length balls in his attack, he may make up his mind for a long day's work.

As soon as he has mastered length, he must try to add to his skill the power of breaking the ball, and then he may safely believe that he is within measurable distance of becoming first class. The amount of break he can get on the ball will depend very much on his pace. Should he be fast he must not hope for too much, for the two rarely go together. Slow and medium-pace bowlers do most at that, and get from one inch to two feet on a favourable wicket. A very important point is, whatever amount one does put on, to try to have sufficient command of the ball so that if it beat the batsman it will hit the wicket. It is a confession of weakness trying to put on six inches and find it breaking twelve, beating the batsman and yet missing the wicket.

I have seen Spofforth, time after time, vary his break from three to twelve inches the same over, and