Cricket ground

“ Cricket, as played in my alley, is less noisy than football, in which anything that comes handy as a substitute for the ball may be used, preferably an old, jagged salmon-tin. But cricket lasts longer, the nerves of the parents whose windows overlook the cricket ground being able to stand it better. ”

“ But what is cricket? Descriptions of lively things are apt to be dull, and it is indeed no easy task to render a detailed description of cricket intelligible, much less entertaining, to the uninitiated. The veriest enthusiast never thought the forty-seven "laws of cricket" light reading, and, resembling as they do certain other statutes whose only apparent design is to perplex the inquiring layman, they would, if cited here, be "caviare to the general."
But come with us, in imagination, on a bright May-day to a great match—say on the Germantown cricket-ground. ”

“ A spectator picks the ball up, chucks it to the expectant field, who dribbles it along the ground to the bowler, while the batsman, having had his smack, saunters about in the most unconcerned way and prepares for the next ball. Cricketers well understand that this saving of breath to a batsman is an enormous advantage; he is enabled to stand quite cool and collected in his ground, and hit away without, as a rule, having to run more than two runs, while the bowlers and field are perspiring away in their efforts to get the side out. ”

“ There are two sorts of country cricket. There is the variety you get at a country-house, where the wicket is prepared with a care as meticulous as that in fashion on any county ground; where red marl and such-like aids to smoothness have been injected into the turf all through the winter; and where the out-fielding is good and the boundaries spacious. And there is the village match, where cows are apt to stroll on to the pitch before the innings and cover-point stands up to his neck in a furze-bush.
The game which was to decide the fate of Tom and Dick belonged to the latter variety. ”

“ Play is already in progress, so we dutifully keep to the right behind the white screen, and passing across the end of the cricket ground, mount to the upper ground, which is separated from the lower one by a steep grassy bank some 12 or 15 feet high, with several flights of stone steps. ”

“ All repair to a small common, called the cricket ground, and a grand match takes place between the Purton club and the Stretton club; there are about twenty candidates of a side. The vanquished parties pay a shilling each to defray the expense of a cold collation, which is previously provided in a pleasant little copse adjoining the cricket-ground, and the remainder of the day is spent convivially. ”

“ The origin of cricket it was, no doubt, and as such is to be most piously revered, but actual cricket—hardly. Consider that old print of a game in progress on the Artillery Fields, where the players are equipped with the curved bats, wear knee-breeches, and the wicket is low and wide, with two stumps upright and one across. There is not a fieldsman on the off side of the wicket—a significant fact in itself; but further, and far more significant, a spectator is reclining on the ground, entirely at his ease, precisely in the position that point would occupy to-day. ”

“ Except the final mowing and light rolling on the morning of the match, wickets should be prepared three days in advance. It is often fatal to good cricket to employ the heavy roller on the day the match commences. Should the grass be so dense as to make the wicket slow, a broom deftly used, followed by a hand mower, run several times between the wickets and across the ground also, will affect a marked improvement in the pace. The preparation can be finished with the small roller.
Plantains should never be tolerated on a cricket ground. ”

“ My sisters did not play the game, as has been so often stated; but my mother and they fielded the ball if it travelled their way, and bowled a ball or two occasionally to Fred and myself when we were boys. That was the extent of their efforts.
My memory carries me back to my sixth year. Most boys at that age have more to do with the nursery than a cricket ground; but it must be remembered that my family was a cricketing one in every sense of the word, and a cricket ground in front of one's home at that time rare and exceptional. ”

“ The senior ground, and indeed the others, are formed terrace-fashion on what used to be rather a severe slope, at least for the purposes of cricket. As it is, the main ground is somewhat circumscribed in dimensions, and a big hit is sure to pass the border; but the wicket is in every way admirable, and the surroundings delightful. It may be added that the edge of the terrace is reckoned a boundary, so that hits for seven or eight, common on the similar ground at Marlborough, are impossible. ”

“ Nothing is so apt to take the zeal and pluck out of a boy as being knocked about on bad wickets. It is customary at some schools to allow boys to play football during the winter months on the same ground on which cricket is played during the summer. Even if football is not played over the match-pitches, a cricket-ground is certainly not benefited by such rough usage. The out-fielding and practice-wickets are sure to suffer. Every attempt ought to be made to separate football- and cricket-grounds. ”

“ I have tried hard, especially of late years, to arrange so that I could reach the ground in good time and save everything in the shape of hurry or bustle. There are but few cricket grounds within a hundred miles of each otherwhere the light and conditions are alike, and it takes some time for eye and mind to accommodate themselves to new surroundings. ”

“ The consequence is that by one consent the centre of the green is always left for good matches, and as every village boy learns the management of turf, you would be surprised to see what an admirable pitch youngsters of fourteen or fifteen years of age will make for themselves on somewhat rough ground with the aid of a fivepronged fork, a watering-pot and a hand-roller; and you would be surprised to see what real good cricket many of them play. ”

“ They had lo acres of cricketground in the middle of the Parks, containing a match-ground, with a practice-ground always available. Had they waited much longer they would not have got so much, because planting, football which has immensely increased since 1881, and other interests, would have been too strong. They had what is wanted for the early Oxford season—a hard, fast ground, much more fitted to prepare them for Lord's. They had a pavilion worthy of the club, exactly behind the wicket as at Lord's, and exactly at the same distance from the wickets as at Lord's. ”

“ Although the ground when in this condition is in favour of the batsman, cricket is miserable under such circumstances, and is enjoyed neither by batsman, bowler, nor fielders. The batsman cannot stand on the slippery mud; the bowler, with wet dirty hands, and boots and trousers bespattered with slush, is utterly unable to do anything with the slimy ball; and the fieldsmen can neither hold nor stop it. ”

“ Lord begs to inform the Noblemen and Gentlemen, lovers of Cricket, that he has enclosed and levelled a large piece of Ground, at the top of Lisson Grove, a short distance from his old Ground, which, for size and beauty of situation cannot be excelled, which will be ready for playing on by the beginning of May, to be known by the name of Lord’s Saint John’s Wood Cricket Ground. ”

“ In a narrow strip of ground we called our garden we would play a cricket of our own, encompassed about by many novel rules, rendered necessary by the locality. For instance, all hitting to leg was forbidden, as tending to endanger neighbouring windows, while hitting to off was likewise not to be encouraged, as causing a temporary adjournment of the game, while batter and bowler went through the house and out into the street to recover the ball from some predatory crowd of urchins to whom it had evidently appeared as a gift direct from Heaven. ”

“ The side that bats second is nearly always in at the close of the first day's play, and the lights and shadows between six and seven often make the ball very difficult to judge accurately; at Lord's, especially, the light gets bad towards the close of the day; a haze overspreads the ground, making clear and accurate sight extremely difficult. As for the respective difficulties of making and saving runs, a cricketer need only look at his scores and references to see how often the out side at the close of a match has prevented the in side from getting the runs required. ”

“ For one that possessed a ground of its own, a dozen had to be content with the open common. Nor were schools so considerate about playing cricket in his time, and players had many difficulties in the way of practising and learning. The greatest difficulty he had to contend against was the distance to the ground. Clubs in the neighbourhood of Bristol were singularly fortunate in one respect: they had plenty of open ground then, as they have now. ”

“ The external circumstances which affect the state of a cricket-ground are chiefly rain and sun. And it is difficult to calculate exactly what damp or heat is doing. Nothing but experience and observation can qualify a captain to be a judge of the states of grounds. ”

“ Cape Town and Port Elizabeth are the only two cricket grounds in South Africa which can boast of a grass out-field; all the other grounds are absolutely innocent of a blade of grass, being nothing, indeed, but a brown-reddish sand—somewhat like the colour of the sand on the sea-shore—rolled into a flat and hard surface. The matting is stretched on this sand, and makes a hard, true, and very fast wicket, while the ball, once past a fielder, simply flies to the boundary. ”

“ Fellowes bowl on any but the smoothest ground—why then, we will not say that any thing which that hardest of hitters and thorough cricketer does, is not cricket, but certainly it is anything but play. ”

“ The dangers of this play are obvious to every cricketer, for it leaves him at the mercy of the ball that bumps, hangs, or turns. Modern grounds are so good that this stroke is far safer than it used to be; for in the majority of instances the ball comes straight on, and only the experienced observer sees that the batsman comes off with flying colours owing to the excellence of the ground rather than to his skill. ”

“ I doubt if there be any scene in the world more animating or delightful than a cricket match. I do not mean a set match at Lord's Ground--no! the cricket I mean is a real solid, old-fashioned match between neighbouring parishes, where each attacks the other for honour and a supper. ”

“ And, as to the bat, look at the picture of cricket as played in the old Artillery Ground; the bat is curved at the end like a hockey stick, or the handle of a spoon, and—as common implements usually are adapted to the work to be performed—you will readily believe that in olden time the freest hitter was the best batsman. The bowling was all along the ground, hand and eye being everything, and judgment nothing; because, the art originally was to bowl under the bat. The wicket was too low for rising balls ”

“ The ground is covered with sawdust, without the use of which it would be impossible for the bowler to grasp the ball firmly, and altogether the whole scene is so unlike cricket, essentially a fine-weather game, that it always seems a pity under such conditions to go on playing. ”

“ He may even have courageously learnt to pin his right foot firmly to the ground; but, notwithstanding this, the result of his efforts will be that, though all proper and necessary postures may be assumed, he will be bowled out, for the bat, except by a lucky chance, will always be in the wrong place, though held quite straight. If cricket could be played with no ball, the careful eyeless cricketer would shine ”

“ Ancient surviving forms in which a similar principle exists are 'rounders' and 'stool-ball.' The former has been developed in America into the scientific game of base-ball,' the name being Old English, while the scientific perfection is American. It is impossible to trace cricket farther back than games in which points are scored in proportion to the amount of ground that the hitter can cover before the return of the struck ball. ”

“ The points of difference are chiefly these: (1) the balls must be swift, and bowled along the ground; (2) the batsman must hit—“slog” is the term; and (3) the game is played at a single wicket. Bat, ball, and wickets differ in shape and size from those used in cricket proper. In Father Gerard’s Stonyhurst will be found a detailed account of the game, and a connection is traced between it and a crude form once played at Eton. It is in all probability a survival of very primitive cricket which became stereotyped because of the life of the College abroad. ”

“ Great improvements have been made at Trent Bridge in the way of entirely enclosing the ground by walls, erecting a handsome covered stand, building bicycle-stores, and making a bowling-green. A club and ground staff has also been engaged, which promises well for the training of young cricketers. ”

“ In these early days, when one was only a small spectator, ay, and in later days too, the great difficulty of cricket was that excellent thing in itself, too much patriotism. Almost the whole population of a town would come to the ground and take such a keen interest in the fortunes of their side, that the other side, if it won, was in some danger of rough handling. ”