Page:EB1911 - Volume 07.djvu/461

Rh initiative, in the one case if the bowler’s delivery passes the batsman beyond the reach of his bat (“wide”), and in the other if he delivers the ball without having either foot touching the ground behind the “bowling crease” and within the “return crease,” or if the ball be jerked or thrown instead of being bona fide “bowled.” “Wides” and “no-balls” count as one “run” each, and all “extras” are added to the score of the side without being credited to any individual batsman. The batsman may, however, hit a “no-ball” and make runs off it, the runs so made being scored to the striker’s credit instead of the “no-ball” being entered among the “extras.” The batsman may be “run out” in attempting a run off a “no-ball,” but cannot be put out off it in any other way. “Byes” are runs made off a ball which touches neither the bat nor the person of the batsman, “leg-byes” off a ball which, without touching the bat or hand, touches any other part of his person. With the exception of these “extras” the score consists entirely of runs made off the bat.

Batting is the most scientific feature of the game. Proficiency in it, as in golf and tennis, depends in the first instance to a great extent on the player assuming a correct attitude for making his stroke, the position of leg, shoulder and

elbow being a matter of importance; and although a quick and accurate eye may occasionally be sufficient by itself to make a tolerably successful run-getter, good style can never be acquired, and a consistently high level of achievement can seldom be gained, by a batsman who has neglected these rudiments. Good batting consists in a defence that is proof against all the bowler’s craft, combined with the skill to seize every opportunity for making runs that the latter may inadvertently offer. If the batsman’s whole task consisted in keeping the ball out of his wicket, the accomplishment of his art would be comparatively simple; it is the necessity for doing this while at the same time he must prevent the ball from rising off his bat into the air in the direction of any one of eleven skilfully-placed fielders, each eager to catch him out, that offers scope for the science of a Grace, a MacLaren or a Trumper. In early days when the wickets were low and the ball was trundled along the ground, the curved bats of the old pictures were probably well adapted for hitting, defence being neglected; but when the height of the wickets was raised, and bowlers began to pitch the ball closer to the batsman so that it would reach the wicket on the first bound, defence of the wicket became more necessary and more difficult. Hence the modern straight-bladed bat was produced, and a more scientific method of batting became possible. Batting and bowling have in fact developed together, a new form of attack requiring a new form of defence. One of the first principles a young batsman has to learn is to play with a “a straight bat” when defending his wicket against straight balls. This means that the whole blade of the bat should be equally opposite to the line on which the ball is travelling towards him, in order that the ball, to whatever height it may bound from the ground, may meet the bat unless it rises altogether over the batsman’s hands; the tendency of the untutored cricketer being on the contrary to hold the bat sloping outwards from the handle to the point, as the golf-player holds his “driver,” so that the rise of the ball is apt to carry it clear of the blade. Standing then in a correct position and playing with a straight bat, the batsman’s chief concern is to calculate accurately the “length” of the ball as soon as he sees it leave the bowler’s hand. The “length” of the ball means the distance from the batsman at which it pitches, and “good length” is the first essential of the bowler’s art. The distance that constitutes “good length” is not, however, to be defined by precise measurement; it depends on the condition of the ground, and on the reach of the batsman. A “good-length ball” is one that pitches too far from the batsman for him to reach out to meet it with the bat at the moment it touches the ground or immediately it begins to rise, in the manner known as “playing forward”; and at the same time not far enough from him to enable him to wait till after it has reached the highest point in its bound before playing it with the bat, i.e. “playing back.” When, owing to the good length of the ball, the batsman is unable to play it in either of these two ways, but is compelled to play at it in the middle of its rise from the ground, he is almost certain, if he does not miss it altogether, to send it up in the air with the danger of being caught out. If through miscalculation the batsman plays forward to a short-pitched ball, he will probably give a catch to the bowler or “mid off,” if he plays back to a well-pitched-up ball, he will probably miss it and be bowled out. The bowler is therefore continually trying to pitch balls just too short for safe forward play, while the batsman defends his wicket by playing forward or back as his judgment directs so long as the bowling is straight and of approximately good length, and is ready the instant he receives a bad-length ball, or one safely wide of the wicket, to hit it along the ground clear of the fieldsmen so as to make as many runs as he and his partner can accomplish before the ball is returned to the wicket-keeper or the bowler. But even those balls off which runs are scored are not to be hit recklessly or without scientific method. A different stroke is brought into requisition according to the length of the ball and its distance wide of the wicket to the “off” or “on” as the case may be; and the greatest batsmen are those who with an almost impregnable defence combine the greatest variety of strokes, which as occasion demands they can make with confidence and certainty. There are, however, comparatively few cricketers who do not excel in some particular strokes more than in others. One will make most of his runs by “cuts” past “point,” or by wrist strokes behind the wicket, while others, like the famous Middlesex Etonian C. I. Thornton, and the Australian C. J. Bonnor, depend mainly on powerful “drives” into the deep field behind the bowler’s wicket. Some again, though proficient in all-round play, develop exceptional skill in some one stroke which other first-class players seldom attempt. A good illustration is the “glance stroke” off the legs which K. S. Ranjitsinhji made with such ease and grace. All great cricketers in fact, while observing certain general principles, display some individuality of style, and a bowler who is familiar with a batsman’s play is often aware of some idiosyncrasy of which he can take advantage in his attack.

Bowling is, indeed, scarcely less scientific than batting. It is not, however, so systematically taught to young amateurs, and it may be partly in consequence of this neglect that amateur bowling is exceedingly weak in England as

compared with that of professionals. The evolution of the art of bowling, for it has been an evolution, is an interesting chapter in the history of cricket which can only be briefly outlined here. The fundamental law as to the proper mode of the bowler’s delivering the ball is that the ball must be bowled, not thrown or jerked. When bowling underhand along the ground was superseded by “length bowling,” it was found that the ball might be caused, by jerking, to travel at a pace which on the rough grounds was considered dangerous; hence the law against jerking, which was administered practically by chalking the inside of the bowler’s elbow; if a chalk mark was found on his side, the ball was not allowed as fair. The necessity of keeping the elbow away from the side led gradually to the extension of the arm horizontally and to round-arm bowling, the invention of which is usually attributed to John Wills (or Willes; b. 1777) of Kent and Sussex. Nyren, however, says “Tom Walker (about 1790) began the system of throwing instead of bowling now so much the fashion”; and, “The first I recollect seeing revive this fashion was Wills, a Sussex man,” the date of the revival being 1807. Walker was no-balled. Beldham (1766–1862) says, “The law against jerking was owing to the frightful pace Tom Walker put on, and I believe that he afterwards tried something more like the modern throwing-bowling. Willes was not the inventor of that kind, or round-arm bowling. He only revived what was forgotten or new to the young folk.” Curiously enough, Beldham also writes of the same Tom Walker that he was “the first lobbing slow bowler” he ever saw, and that he “did feel so ashamed of such baby bowling, but after all he did more than even David Harris himself.” Round-arm bowling was long and vigorously opposed, especially in 1826 when three matches were arranged between England and Sussex, the Sussex bowlers being round-arm bowlers. When England had lost the first two matches, nine of the professionals refused