W. G. Grace

“ Every player of the twenty-two was naturally anxious to do his best against such celebrated players, for well he knew that his success would be talked about over the length and breadth of the land. To keep up one's wicket for half-an-hour, even without scoring, against the best bowling in England, v/as to create a reputation locally; to score a double figure and be praised by one of those great men, was something to boast of for a lifetime. ”

“ When any player of note tells you that he plays the first over or two without a slight feeling of that kind, and that he is as cool and confident then as he is the last over, do not be discouraged if it be different with you, or say, "That accounts for his scoring more freely than I do." Perfect command of nerve at the beginning of an innings is much to be desired, if it do not lead to over-confidence; but the very few I have met who said they possessed it have always given me the impression of being too eager to score the first over or two, and hit rather wildly to accomplish their end. ”

“ It is told of Clarke's Eleven that on one occasion when it visited Cornwall a man fielding at long-on flushed a covey of partridges, and that a patch 40 yards by 10 was the only part of the ground that was ever cut or rolled. But it might, in a degree, be attributed to the fact that professional players did not cultivate batting as much as bowling, knowing that, however good they might be at the former, they must excel in the latter to secure an engagement with a club of any importance. The aim of every club was to engage a good bowler as soon as its finances permitted. ”

“ The batting averages leaped up considerably in 1866; seven amateurs had an average of thirty runs and over per innings, while only one professional reached that figure; and there were fifteen amateurs with an average of over twenty, to four professionals. But the professionals had quite as great a monopoly of the bowling; thirteen to four was their proportion in that department. And so it went on for twenty years; the amateurs keeping a strong lead with the bat, the professionals with the ball. ”

“ Peate, of Yorkshire, had now become the acknowledged best slow bowler of England, and Emmett was as good as ever. Crossland, for Lancashire, strongly illustrated the usefulness of a fast bowler on a side. So good had become the wickets everywhere, that slow bowling was losing its sting, and good judges were of the opinion that it was the pace of the Australians' bowling which produced such excellent results.
Gloucestershire, Middlesex, Surrey and Kent were much in want of bowling of all kinds, and Sussex and Derbyshire were still far behind the others. ”

“ Good fielding was his strong point, and he used to insist upon his team practising throwing and catching all round the field. Another important order was that, one night a week at least, sides should be chosen, and every one play as if it were a match.
My uncle Alfred Pocock was 5 ft. 9 ins. in height; weight, 12 st. 7 lb. When he first played for the Mangotsfield Club, he did not possess the skill which made him so valuable to E. M., Fred, and myself; but, infected by my father's earnestness, he practised diligently and acquired great power with both bat and ball. ”

“ I was on the ground, with Henry, ready to play in the Surrey match on the 11th July. The captain of the South Wales team approached Henry, and asked him if he objected to my standing out against the Gentlemen of Sussex at Brighton, as he had the offer of a very good player, and he believed their opponents were exceptionally strong. Henry objected very much. "To begin with," he said, "the boy was asked to play in both matches, and he shall play in both matches or none; and I only hope every member of the team will do as well as I expect him to do." ”

“ Then he would show me how to hold the bat so as to use it freely; give me guard according to the side of the wicket he bowled; place my feet in the proper position, and impress on me the need to stand upright. For months, for years I might say, I had to be content with simply stopping the ball, happy if I could keep it away from the wicket.
"Keep your left shoulder well forward, and get over the ball," he kept drumming into our heads; "until you do that, you will never do any good. And keep your eye fixed on the bowler, and never lose sight of the ball from the time it leaves his hands. ”

“ A marked improvement was witnessed in batting in the year 1866. Hardly a week passed without an individual innings of a hundred runs in an innings being recorded in some match or another; and before the season was at an end, 200 runs was exceeded four times. The averages reached a figure undreamt of a few years before, and the once-coveted double figure had become quite common. An aggregate of 1000 runs, which was at one time considered a very exceptional feat, was accomplished by eighteen batsmen, ten of them amateurs; many of the batsmen, however, played few or no first-class matches. ”

“ From 1870 to 1890 Nottinghamshire stands out preeminently amongst the first-class counties, having been at the head of the list seven times, while it will be seen Sussex has been at the bottom eight times.
I shall not trouble my readers by saying much about the future of the counties. Surrey and Nottinghamshire's prospects are as bright to-day as at any time in their history; but, then, the brightest prospects have often been shattered in cricket, and many a county that was expected to do well has done ill. It is never safe to prophesy when the unexpected happens so often. ”

“ Understand now and for good, you boys," said he, "I shall not allow you in future to take part in any match which is played for money, as it is introducing a form of gambling into the game, which is wrong and must do harm to it."
Mr. Williams turned up on the appointed date. The Bristol team was even stronger than on the first occasion, and could not keep from laughing at the team opposed to them. Mr. Williams and my father chatted together, without the slightest sign of dismay on their faces. ”

“ Good players can be reckoned by the score, who will tell you that a mistake of that kind was made with them in their early days, and that they never got thoroughly over it.
To my uncle great credit is due for teaching me, and I sincerely wish that every boy who reads this may possess a teacher as patient and as capable. His first piece of advice was:
"Use a bat suited to your height and strength, and if you stand properly and play straight, you ought to be able to keep the ball from hitting your wicket." ”

“ For the first time since Carpenter, Hayward, Daft, and one or two others were the most prominent batsmen, the professionals could show a larger number than the gentlemen in the list of the averages. For more than ten years the gentlemen could show a proportion of two to one; in 1885 it was the other way. Shrewsbury had much the best average of the year, though it will be seen that he did not play half the number of innings which Mr. W. W. Read played. His defence had become stronger than ever, and his wicket was about the most difficult one in England to capture. ”

“ By the time I was nine years old I had got over the elementary stage of stopping the ball, and was slowly acquiring power in meeting it firmly and playing it away. Playing with a straight bat had become easy to me; and my uncle told me I was on the right track, and patiently I continued in it. In my tenth year I could play a ball from my wicket with a fair amount of confidence. "Do not allow the bowler to stick you up, or it is all over with you," he said. ”

“ Midwinter was the first professional who played for Gloucestershire, and his bowling considerably strengthened it. For some years Gloucestershire and Middlesex had been called the counties of amateurs, and it was entirely owing to their great batting skill that they had held their own against what may be called the professional counties. We have only to refer to the batting averages to find that the professionals were still very far behind the amateurs in that branch of the game. The fact seems to have impressed itself rather strongly upon the Lancashire and Surrey Committees about this time ”

“ Very rarely, if ever, has any young player done so well on a first appearance; indeed, it is held very generally by the Australians themselves that young players never play up to their form the first tour, and we have only to look at the performances of Charlton, Walters, and others to see the truth of it. ”

“ The history of county cricket is worthy of a book to itself, and cannot have justice done to it here. Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Middlesex, Hampshire and Nottinghamshire have been in existence for more than one hundred years; and all of them, at one time or another, were strong enough to play an Eleven of England. But county cricket pure and simple may be said to have reached its highest development in the last twenty years. Yorkshire was established in the early part of the present century, Lancashire in 1864, and Gloucestershire and Derbyshire in 1870. ”

“ A good many of us can date our first experience of first-class play from witnessing the famous All-England Eleven, and hundreds will tell with glistening eyes of the good old times when they were considered worthy of a place against it. ”

“ It is almost impossible to praise Turner and Ferris too highly for their great bowling performances. Murdoch, like McDonnell, found that they were head and shoulders above everybody else, and he must have had many an anxious quarter of an hour speculating what the team would do in the case of either breaking down. ”

“ Counties in the South have greater difficulties to contend against in obtaining first-class bowlers than the counties in the North, but all of them are striving their utmost to meet the difficulty and keep their position in contests which are now looked upon as the most exciting of all: contests which have become the backbone of the game. ”

“ With Freeman and Emmett at their best, however, the North could hold its own without them, and the contests ranked next in importance to those between the Gentlemen and Players. They met three times during the season, and the South won two out of the three. I batted six times, and scored altogether 258 runs. My best innings was in the second match played at Sheffield, when I scored 122 out of a total of 173, against Freeman, Emmett and Wootton. And I was fairly successful with the ball in the same match, capturing six wickets for 57 runs first innings. ”

“ Nottinghamshire and Surrey had a very close race for first place in county honours, and finished about equal. Both now possessed very strong teams, the Surrey committee in particular straining every nerve to obtain promising recruits.
The Players won their match against the Gentlemen at Lord's by five wickets; whilst that at the Oval was drawn, very much in their favour. The opinion was gaining ground about this time that unless the Gentlemen cultivated bowling more, the Players would shortly have much the best of the contests. ”

“ The lesson I have desired to convey to young players is, that my doings in the cricket world at that period of my life, if they are of any value, were owing to my father and uncle's stimulating examples, and perseverance on my own part. When the associations and surroundings are favourable, there can be little doubt that perseverance will work wonders, if love and enthusiasm go with it. Love and enthusiasm we all possessed from the oldest to the youngest, and we possess it to-day. ”

“ The professionals are now the equals of the amateurs in batting and fielding, and their superiors in bowling. And I am very much afraid it is likely to continue so for a considerable time. Amateur bowling is weaker to-day than it has been for many years, while the outlook for the future is not particularly bright. It used to be said, some twenty years ago, that it was always safe to back the Players against the Gentlemen. ”

“ Emmett and Freeman proved invaluable to their county, and- it was owing entirely to their allround efforts that Yorkshire, after being at the bottom of the poll in 1866, was raised to the top in 1867 not losing a single match in the six played.
Neither Surrey, Kent, Cambridgeshire, nor Middlesex kept up its 1866 form; but Sussex and Lancashire showed improvement, and Nottinghamshire was still well to the front. Nottinghamshire played one match against the North of England, which practically meant the combined strength of Lancashire, Yorkshire, and Cambridgeshire, but was beaten by 112 runs. ”

“ It had fulfilled what my father had in view when he formed the Mangotsfield Club to spread a knowledge of the game in the district, and teach his boys to play. That its success as a club gave him pleasure I do not require to say. My uncle and he little thought their efforts would bear such fruit, or that the orchard at Downend would be cherished so dearly. They had watched their boys grow into men, able to hold their own in the cricket-field, and accepting defeat and victory in the right spirit. ”

“ We played Glamorganshire once, Surrey twice, M.C.C. and Ground once, winning them very easily. The first match we played was against Surrey, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th June, on Durdham Downs. Our eleven was made up entirely of amateurs, while Surrey played ten professionals and one amateur. It was the closest match we played, and created considerable interest in Gloucestershire. Quite a large crowd turned out, and we had some difficulty in getting them to stand far enough back. I remember that in the first innings Pooley, who was batting very well, would not go on until they were moved. ”

“ As the Eleven grew in strength and popularity, the desire to be considered, worthy of a place in it became the aim of evry young and rising cricketer, and on more, than one occasion some of the celebrated amateurs were to be found playing in its ranks for the honour alone. Of course the difficulty was to find clubs of any strength to compete against. Usually the number of their opponents was twenty-two; but very often that was found inadequate to make a fight against so strong a combination of talent, and recourse was had to players outside of the club. ”

“ Very soon equally good players could be seen outside of the famous elevens, and the demands of the different players in some cases reasonable, in others unreasonable could either be granted or firmly refused. The M.C.C. was now playing the Colts of England, for the purpose of discovering rising talent; and county clubs were doing the same thing. Public schools, colleges, and other clubs were also adding to the number. The Na Shuler Club, holding pretty much the same position in Ireland as the I Zingari in England, was formed in 1863 ”

“ Amateur efforts do not, as a rule, meet with success, for the reason that too often no one is responsible and the element of self-interest wanting. The I Zingari club has been a brilliant exception; but since it was formed a hundred clubs could be named which, conducted on somewhat similar lines, have died after a few years of struggling existence. The All-England Eleven was started by one man, and conducted on business principles; and while it lived it was exceedingly active, and helped to spread a knowledge of the game. William Clarke was the founder ”

“ The professionals not only maintained their superiority with the ball, but challenged the supremacy of the amateurs with the bat. For twenty completed innings in first-class matches, thirteen professionals had an average of over twenty-three runs per innings ”

“ Sussex, Kent, and Gloucestershire being in that unfortunate position. Midwinter's return to Australia weakened the Gloucestershire eleven, and there was no one springing up to take his place.
Professional batting was improving rapidly, and Shrewsbury and two or three others were in excellent form. If anything, they were playing over-carefully. The desire to show well in the averages was creating a school of slow scorers whose aim was to keep up their wicket and let the runs come. Twenty to thirty runs an hour was a good pace of scoring with them. ”