Page:The Crisis in Cricket and the Leg Before Rule (1928).djvu/67

Rh wickets that have killed them off." "Give him a little encouragement. . . and we shall have as good fast bowlers as we ever had." Again in the Evening Standard of the 25th May, 1927, there will be found some remarks made by Larwood, the young Nottingham fast bowler, who apparently had been talking to Strudwick, and he writes: "Struddy told me that if Tom Richardson were bowling to-day he would not be any more successful than the average fast bowler."

I do not altogether agree with Strudwick's last remark, but what he writes about the modern lifeless wickets is true and should be borne in mind by those who are so ready to throw all the blame on the unfortunate bowlers for the present unsatisfactory state of things. Some time in the middle of June of last year I was watching a match at the Oval, with the ground for the most part as hard as a drought for five weeks could make it. The ball was thrown in from the deep field about forty yards in the air and came down on the marled part just on the pitch, and instead of bounding about five or six feet in the air rose as if it had been pitched on a sort of mattress. The groundsman cannot be blamed, he is supposed to make a wicket as easy to bat on as he can; he gives no thought to the bowler and very likely congratulates himself when, after three full days' cricket, as in the match between Lancashire and Yorkshire in 1926, 861 runs are scored for nineteen wickets, and of course another detestable draw is the final result.

In Australia, as will be seen later, batting has been made so easy that matches run sometimes to more than a week, and this is the result of wickets being prepared to