The Cricket Field: Or, the History and Science of the Game of Cricket

The bat must not be purposely presented edgeways in the least degree. Draw a full bat from the line of the middle stump to meet a leg-stump ball, and, as the line of the ball must make a very acute angle, you will have the benefit of a hit without lessening your defence. “A Draw is very dangerous with a ball that would hit the leg stump,” some say; but only when attempted in the wrong way; for, how can a full bat increase your danger?

This mode of play will also lead to, what is most valuable but most rare, a correct habit of passing every ball the least to the Near side of middle stump clear away to the On side. This blocking between legs and wickets, first, obviates the ball going off legs into wicket; secondly, it keeps many awkward balls out of Slip’s hands; and, thirdly, it makes single runs off the best balls.

Too little, now-a-days, is done with the Draw; too much is attempted by the “blind swipe,” to the loss of many wickets.

Every man in a first-rate match who loses his wicket, while swiping round, ought to pay a forfeit to the Reward Fund.

The only balls for the Draw are those which threaten the wicket. To shuffle backwards half a yard, scraping the bat on the ground, or to let the ball pass one side the body with a blind swing on the other, are hits which to mention is to reprove.

Our good friend, Mr. Abraham Bass,—and what cricketer in the Midland Counties defers not to his judgment?—thinks that the Draw cannot be made quite so much of as we say, except by a left-handed man. The short-pitched balls which some draw, he thinks, are best played back to middle On, by a turn of the left arm to the On side.

Here Mr. Bass mentions a very good hit—a good variety—and one, too, little practised: his hit and the Draw are each good in their respective places. To discriminate every shade is impossible. “Mr. Taylor had most hits I ever saw,” said Caldecourt, “and was a better player even than Lord Frederick; though Mr. Taylor’s hits were not all legitimate:” so much the better; new combinations of old hits.

As to the old-fashioned hit under leg, Mr. Mynn, at Leicester, in 1836, gave great effect to one variety of it; a hit which Pilch makes useful, though hard to make elegant. Some say, with Caldecourt, such balls ought always to be drawn: but is it not a useful variety?

Draw or Glance from off Stump.—What is true of the Leg stump is true of the Off, care being taken of catch to Slips. Every ball played from two Off stumps, by free play of wrist and left shoulder well over, should go away among the Slips. Play hard on the ball; the ball must never hit a dead bat; and every so-called block, from off stumps, must be a hit.

Commence, as always, from fig. 1.; stand close up to your wicket; weight on pivot-foot; balance-foot ready to come over as required. This is the only position from which you can command the off stump.

Bear with me, my friends, in dwelling so much on this Off-play. Many fine cutters could never in their lives command off stump with a full and upright bat. Whence come the many misses of off-hits? Observe, and you will see, it is because the bat is slanting, or it must sweep the whole space through which the ball could rise.

By standing close up, and playing well over your wicket with straight bat, and throwing, by means of left leg, the body forwards over a ball rising to the off-stump, you may make an effective hit from an off-bailer without lessening your defence; for how can hard blocking, with a full bat, be dangerous? All that is required is, straight play and a free wrist, though certainly a tall man has here a great advantage.

A free Wrist.—Without wrist play there can be no good style of batting. Do not be puzzled about “throwing your body into your hit.” Absurd, except with straight hits—half-volley, for instance. Suspend a ball, oscillating by a string from a beam, keep your right foot fixed, and use the left leg to give the time and command of the ball and to adjust the balance, and you will soon learn the power of the wrists and arms. Also, use no heavy bats; 2 lbs. 2 oz. is heavy enough for any man who plays with his wrists. The wrist has, anatomically, two movements; the one up and down, the other from side to side; and to the latter power, by much the least, the weight of the bat must be proportioned. “My old-fashioned bat,” said Mr. E. H. Budd, “weighed nearly three pounds, and Mr. Ward’s a pound more.”

The Off-hit, here intended, is made with upright bat, where the horizontal cut were dangerous or uncertain. It may be made with any off-ball, one or two feet wide of the wicket. The left shoulder must be well over the ball, and this can only be effected by crossing, as in fig. 3. p. 159, left leg over. This, one of the best players agrees, is a correct hit, provided the ball be pitched well up; otherwise he would apply the Cut: but the cut serves only when a ball rises; and I am unwilling to spare one that comes in near the ground.

This upright off-hit, with left leg crossed over, may be practised with a bat and ball in the path of a field. You may also devise some “Chamber Practice,” without any ball, or with a soft ball suspended—not a bad in-door exercise in cold weather. When proficient, you will find that you have only to hit at the ball, and the balance-foot will naturally cross over and adjust itself.

In practising with a bowler, I have often fixed a fourth stump, about six inches from off-stump, and learnt to guard it with upright bat. Experto crede, you may learn to sweep with almost an upright bat balls as much as two feet to the Off. But this is a hit for balls requiring back play, but—

Cover-hit is the hit for over-pitched off-balls. Come forward hard to meet an off-ball; and then, as your bat moves in one line, and the ball meets it in another, the resultant will be Cover-hit. By no means turn the bat: a full face is not only safe but effective.

With all off-hits beware of the bias of the ball to the off, and play well over the ball—very difficult for young players. Never think about what off-hits you can make, unless you keep the ball safely down.

The fine square leg-hit is similar to cover-hit, though on the other side. To make cover-hit clean, and not waste power against the ground, you must take full advantage of your height, and play the bat well down on the ball from your hip, timing nicely, eye still on the ball, and inclining the bat neither too little nor too much.

The Forward Cut, a name by which I would distinguish another off-hit is a hit made by Butler, Guy, Dakin, Parr, and indeed especially by the Nottingham men, who, Clarke thinks, “hit all round them” better than men of any other county (see fig. 3.). The figures being foreshortened as seen by the bowler, the artist unwillingly sacrifices effect to show the correct position of the feet. This hit may be made from balls too wide and too low for the backward cut. Cross the left leg over, watch the ball from its pitch, and you may make off-hits from balls low or cut balls high (unless very high, and then you have time to drop the bat) with more commanding power than in any other position. Some good players do not like this crossing of left foot, preferring the cutting attitude of fig. 3.; but I know from experience and observation, that there is not a finer or more useful hit in the field; for, if a ball is some two feet to the Off, it matters not whether over-pitched or short-pitched, the same position, rather forward, equally applies.

The Forward Cut sends the ball between Point and Middle-wicket, an open part of the field, and even to Long-field sometimes: no little advantage. Also, it admits of much greater quickness. You may thus intercept forward, what you would be too late to cut back.

To learn it, fix a fourth stump in the ground, one foot or more wide to the Off; practise carefully keeping right foot fixed, and crossing left over, and preserve the cutting attitude; and this most brilliant hit is easily acquired.

When you play a ball Off, do not lose your balance and stumble awkwardly one foot over the other, but end in good form, well on your feet. Even good players commit this fault; also, in playing back some players look as if they would tumble over their wicket.

The Cut is generally considered the most delightful hit in the game. The Cut proper is made by very few. Many make Off-hits, but few “cut from the bails between short slip and point with a late horizontal bat—cutting, never by guess but always by sight, at the ball itself; the cut applying to rather short-pitched balls, not actually long hops; and that not being properly a cut which is in advance of the point.” Such is the definition of Mr. Bradshaw, whom a ten years’ retirement has not prevented from being known as one of the best hitters of the day.

The attitude of cutting is faintly given (because foreshortened) in fig. 4. This represents a cut at rather a wide ball; and a comparison of figs. 3. and 4. will show that, with rather wide Off-balls, the Forward Cut is the better position; for you more easily intercept balls before they are out of play. Right leg would be thrown back rather than advanced, were the ball nearer the wicket. Still, the attitude is exceptional. Look at the other figures, and the cutter alone will appear with right foot shifted. Compare fig. 1. with the other figures, and the change is easy, as in the left foot alone; but, compare it with the cuts (figs. 4. and 5.), and the whole position is reversed: right shoulder advanced, and right foot shifted. There is no ball that can be cut which may not be hit by one of the other Off-hits already mentioned, and that with far greater certainty, though not with so brilliant an effect. Pilch and many of the steadiest and best players never make the genuine cut. “Mr. Felix,” says Clarke, “cuts splendidly; but, in order to do so, he cuts before he sees the ball, and thus misses two out of three.” Neither do I believe that any man will reconcile the habitual straight play and command of off-stump, which distinguishes Pilch, with a cutting game. Each virtue, even in Cricket, has its excess: fine Leg-hitters are apt to endanger the leg-stump; fine Cutters, the Off. For, the Cutter must begin to take up his altered position so soon, that the idea must be running in his head almost while the ball is being delivered; then, the first impulse brings the bat at once out of all defensive and straight play. Right shoulder involuntarily starts back; and, if at the wrong kind of ball, the wicket is exposed, and all defence at an end. But with long-hops there is time enough to cut; the difficulty is with good balls: and, to cut them, not by guess but, by sight. Fig. 5. represents a cut at a ball nearer the wicket, the right foot being drawn back to gain space.

So much for the abuse of Cutting. If the ball does not rise, there can be no Cut, however loose the bowling; though, with the other Off-hits, two or three might be scored. The most winning game is that which plays the greatest number of balls—an art in which no man can surpass Baldwinson of Yorkshire. Still a first-rate player should have a command of every hit: a bowler may be pitching uniformly short, and the balls may be rising regularly: in this case, every one would like to see a good Cutter at the wicket.

To learn the Cut, suspend a ball from a string and a beam, oscillating backwards and forwards—place yourself as at a wicket, and experimentalise. You will find:—

1. You have no power in Cutting, unless you Cut late—“off the bails:” then only can you use the point of your bat.

2. You have no power, unless you turn on the basis of your feet, and front the ball, your back being almost turned upon the bowler, at the moment of cutting.

3. Your muscles have very little power in Cutting quite horizontally, but very great power in Cutting down on the ball.

This agrees with the practice of the best players. Mr. Bradshaw follows the ball and cuts very late, cutting down. He drops his bat, apparently, on the top of the ball. Lord Frederick used to describe the old-fashioned Cutting as done in the same way. Mr. Bradshaw never Cuts but by sight; and since, when the eye catches the rise of a good length ball, not a moment must be lost, his bat is thrown back just a little—an inch or two higher than the bails (he stoops a little for the purpose)—and dropped on the ball in an instant, by play of the wrist alone. Thus does he obtain his peculiar power of Cutting even fair-length balls by sight.

Harry Walker, Robinson, and Saunders were the three great Cutters; and they all Cut very late. But the underhand bowling suited cutting (proper) better than round-armed; for all Off-hitting is not cutting. Mr. Felix gives wonderful speed to the ball, effected by cutting down, adding the weight of a descending bat to the free and full power of the shoulder: he would hardly have time for such exertion if he hit with the precision of Mr. Bradshaw, and not hitting till he saw the ball.

Lord Frederick found fault with Mr. Felix’s picture of “the Cut,” saying it implied force from the whirl of the bat; whereas a cut should proceed from wrists alone, descending with bat in hand,—precisely Mr. Bradshaw’s hit. “Excuse me, my Lord,” said Mr. Felix, “that’s not a Cut, but only a pat.” The said pat, or wrist play, I believe to be the only kind of cutting by sight, for good-length balls.

To encourage elegant play, and every variety of hit, we say practise each kind of cut, both Lord Frederick’s pat and Mr. Felix’s off-hit, and the Nottingham forward cut, with left leg over; but beware of using either in the wrong place. A man of one hit is easily managed. A good off-hitter should send the ball according to its pitch, not to one point only, but to three or four. Old Fennex used to stand by Saunders, and say no hitting could be finer—“no hitter such a fool—see, sir, they have found out his hit—put a man to stop his runs—still, cutting, nothing but cutting—why doesn’t the man hit somewhere else?” So with Jarvis of Nottingham, a fine player and one of the best cutters of his day, when a man was placed for his cut, it greatly diminished his score. For off-balls we have given, Off-play to the slips—Cover hit—the Nottingham hit more towards middle wicket; and, the Cut between slip and point—four varieties. Let each have its proper place, till an old player can say, as Fennex said of Beldham, “He hit quick as lightning all round him. He appeared to have no hit in particular: you could never place a man against him: where the ball was pitched there it was hit away.”

Leg-hitting.—Besides the draw, there are two distinct kinds of leg-hits—one forward, the other back. The forward leg-hit is made, as in fig. 6., by advancing the left foot near the pitch of the ball, and then hitting down upon the ball with a free arm, the bat being more or less horizontal, according to the length of the ball. A ball so far pitched as to require little stride of left leg, will be hit with nearly a straight bat: a ball as short as you can stride to, will require nearly a horizontal bat. The ball you can reach with straight bat, will go off on the principle of the cover-hit—the more square the better. But, when a ball is only just within reach, by using a horizontal bat, you know where to find the ball just before it has risen; for, your bat covers the space about the pitch. If you reach far enough, even a shooter may be picked up; and if a few inches short of the pitch, you may have all the joyous spring of a half-volley. The better pitched the bowling, the easier is the hit, if the ball be only a little to the leg. In using a horizontal bat, if you cannot reach nearer than about a foot from the pitch, sweep your bat through the line in which the ball should rise. Look at fig. 7. p. 173. The bat should coincide with or sweep a fair bat’s length of that dotted line. But if the point of the bat cannot reach to within a foot of the pitch, that ball must be played back.

The Short-pitched Leg Ball needs no comment, save that, according as it is more or less to the wicket, you may,—1. Draw it; 2. Play it by a new hit, to be explained, a Draw or glance outside your leg; 3. You may step back on your wicket to gain space, and play it away to middle On, or cut it round, according to your sight of it.

But in leg-hitting, beware of a “blind swipe,” or that chance hit, by guess of where the ball will rise, which some make when the bat cannot properly command the pitch. This blind hit is often made at a ball not short enough to play by sight back, nor long enough to command forward. Parr advances left foot as far as he can, and hits where the ball ought to be. But this he would hardly advise, except you can nearly command the pitch; otherwise, a blind swing of the bat, although the best players are sometimes betrayed into it, is by no means to be recommended.

Reader, do you ever make the square hit On? Or, do you ever drive a ball back from the leg-stump to long-field On? Probably not. Clarke complains that this good old hit is gone out, and that one more man is thereby brought about the wicket. If you cannot make this hit, you have evidently a faulty style of play. So, practise diligently with leg-balls, till balls from two leg-stumps go to long-field On, and balls a little wide of leg-stump go nearly square; and do not do this by a kind of push—much too common,—but by a real hit, left shoulder forward.

Also, do you ever draw out of your ground in a leg-hit? Doubly dangerous is this—danger of stumping and danger of missing easy hits. If once you move your pivot foot, you lose that self-command essential for leg-hits. So, practise, in your garden or your room, the stride and swing of the bat, till you have learnt to preserve your balance.

One of the best leg-hitters is Dakin: and his rule is: keep your right foot firm on your ground; advance the left straight to the pitch, and as far as you can reach, and hit as straight at the pitch as you can, just as if you were hitting to long-field: as the lines of bat and ball form an angle, the ball will fly away square of itself.

My belief is, the Wykehamists introduced the art of hitting leg-balls at the pitch. When, in 1833, at Oxford, Messrs. F. B. Wright and Payne scored above sixty each off Lillywhite and Broadbridge, it was remarked by the players, they had never seen their leg-hit before. Clarke says he showed how to make forward leg-hits at Nottingham. For, the Nottingham men used to hit after leg-balls, and miss them, till he found the way of intercepting them at the rise, and hitting square.

And this will be a fair occasion for qualifying certain remarks which would appear to form what is aptly called a “toe-in-the-hole” player.

When I spoke so strongly about using the right foot as a pivot, and the left as a balance foot, insisting, also, on not moving the right foot, I addressed myself not to proficients, but to learners. Such is the right position for almost all the hits on the ball, and this fixing of the foot is the only way to keep a learner in his proper form.

Experienced players—I mean those who have passed through the University Clubs, and aspire to be chosen in the Gentlemen’s Eleven of All England—must be able to move each foot on its proper occasion, especially with slow bowling. Clarke says, “If I see a man set fast on his legs, I know he can’t play my bowling.” The reason is, as we shall explain presently, that the accurate hitting necessary for slow bowling requires not long reaching, but a short, quick action of the arms and wrists, and activity on the legs, to shift the body to suit this hitting in narrow compass.

A practised player should also be able to go in to over-pitched balls, to give effect to his forward play. To be stumped out looks ill indeed; still, a first-rate player should have confidence and coolness enough to bide his time, and then go boldly and steadily in and hit away. If you do go in, take care you go far enough, and as far as the pitch; and, only go in to straight balls, for to those alone can you carry a full bat. And, never go in to make a free swing of the bat or tremendous swipe. Go in with a straight bat, not so much to hit, as to drive or block the ball hard away, or, as Clarke says, “to run the ball down.” Stepping in only succeeds with cool and judicious hitters, who have some power of execution. All young players must be warned that, for any but a most practised player to leave his ground, is decidedly a losing game.

Supposing the batsman knows how to move his right foot back readily, then, a long-hop to the leg admits of various modes of play, which I feel bound to mention, though not to recommend; for, a first-rate player should at least know every hit: whether he will introduce it much or little into his game is another question.

A leg-ball that can be played by sight is sometimes played by raising the left leg. This is quite a hit of the old school,—of Sparkes and Fennex, for instance. Fennex’s pupil, Fuller Pilch, commonly makes this hit. Some first-rate judges—Caldecourt among others—maintain it should never be made, but the Draw always used instead. Mr. Taylor found it a useful variety; for, before he used it, Wenman used to stump him from balls inside leg stump. For some lengths it has certainly the advantage of placing the ball in a more open part of the field.

Another way to play such balls is to step back with the right foot, and thus gain time and length of hop, and play the ball away, with short action of the arm and wrist, about middle On. This also is good, as making one hit more in your game. Another hit there is which bears a name not very complimentary to Mr. James Dean; though Sampson, of Sheffield, attains in a similar manner remarkable certainty in meeting leg-balls, and not inelegantly. My attention was first called to this hit by watching the play of Mr. E. Reeves, who makes it with all the ease and elegance of the Draw, of which I consider it one variety. Clarke says, that with a ball scarcely wide of your leg, he thinks it a good hit: I have, therefore, given a drawing of it in the last page. When done correctly, and in its proper place, it is made by an easy and elegant movement of the wrists, and looks as pretty as the Draw; but this kind of forward play, which takes an awkward ball at its rise and places it on the On-side, however useful to Sampson of Sheffield and the very few who introduce it in its proper place,—this is a hit which nascitur non fit, must come naturally, as a variety of forward play. To study it, makes a poking game, and spoils the play of hundreds. So, beware how you practise the poke.

“The best way to score from short-pitched leg-balls,” writes a very good hitter, “is to make a sort of sweep with the left foot, almost balancing yourself by the toe of the said left foot, and resting chiefly on the right foot,—at the same time drawing yourself upright and retiring towards the wicket. This of course is all one movement. In this position you make the heel of your right the pivot on which you turn, and move your left (but in a greater circle), so that both preserve the same parallel as at starting, and come round together; and this I regard as the great secret of a batsman’s movement in this hit. This gives you the power of simply playing the ball down, if it rises much, and likewise of hitting hard if it keep within a foot of the ground. Both Sampson and Parr score very much in this style.”

However, with fast bowling, there are almost as many mistakes as runs made by hitting at these short-pitched leg-balls. Pilch, in his later days, would hardly meddle with them.

Lastly, as to leg-balls, remember that almost any one can learn to hit clean up (square, especially); the art is to play them down. Also, leg-hitting alone is very easy; but, to be a good Off-player, and an upright and straight player, and yet hit to leg freely, is very rare. We know a fine leg-hitter who lost his leg-hit entirely when he learnt to play better to the off.

CHAP. VIII.
HINTS AGAINST SLOW BOWLING.

While our ideas on Slow Bowling were yet in a state of solution, they were, all at once, precipitated and crystallised into natural order by the following remarks from a valued correspondent:—

“I have said that Pilch was unequalled with the bat, and his great excellence is in timing the ball. No one ever mastered Lillywhite like Pilch; because, in his forward play, he was not very easily deceived by that wary individual’s repeated change of pace. He plays forward with his eye on, not only the pitch, but on the ball itself, being faster or slower in his advance by a calm calculation of time—a point too little considered by some even of the best batsmen of the day. No man hits much harder than Pilch; and, be it observed, hard hitting is doubly hard, in all fair comparison, when combined with that steady posture which does not sacrifice the defence of the wicket for some one favourite cut or leg-hit. Compare Pilch with good general hitters, who, at the same time, guard their wicket, and I doubt if you can find from this select class a harder hitter in England.”

This habit of playing each ball by correct judgment of its time and merits has made Pilch one of the few who play Old Clarke as he should be played. He plays him back all day if he bowls short, and hits him hard all along the ground, whenever he overpitches; and sometimes he will go in to Clarke’s bowling, but not to make a furious swipe, but to “run him down” with a straight bat. This going in to Clarke’s bowling some persons think necessary for every ball, forgetting that “discretion is the better part of” cricket; the consequence is that many wickets fall from positive long hops. Almost every man who begins to play against Clarke appears to think he is in honour bound to hit every ball out of the field: and, every one who attempts it comes out saying, “What rubbish!—no play in it!” The truth being that there is a great deal of play in it, for it requires real knowledge of the game. You have curved lines to deal with instead of straight ones. “But, what difference does that make?” We shall presently explain.

The amusing part is, that this cry of “What rubbish!” has been going on for years, and still the same error prevails. Experience is not like anything hereditary: the generations of eels do not get used to being skinned, nor do the generations of men get tired of doing the same foolish thing. Each must suffer propriâ personâ, and not by proxy. So, the gradual development of the human mind against Clarke’s bowling is for the most part this:—first, a state of confidence in hitting every ball; secondly, a state of disgust and contempt at what seems only too easy for a scientific player to practise; and, lastly, a slowly increasing conviction that the batsman must have as much head as the bowler, with patience to play an unusual number of good lengths.

Slow bowling is most effective when there is a fast bowler at the other end. It is very puzzling to alter your time in forward play from fast to slow, and slow to fast, every Over: so, Clarke and Wisden work well together. A shooter from a slow bowler is sometimes found even more difficult than one from a fast bowler: and this for two reasons; first, because the batsman is made up for slow time and less prepared for fast; and, secondly, because a good slow ball is pitched further up, and, therefore, though the fast ball shoots quicker, the slow ball has the shorter distance to shoot into the wicket.

Compare the several styles of bowling in the following diagram. A good length ball, you see, pitches nearer to the bat in proportion to the slowness of its pace. Wisden is not so fast, nor is Clarke as slow, practically, as they respectively appear. With Wisden’s straight lines, it is far easier to calculate where the ball will pitch, than with the curved lines and dropping balls of Clarke; and when Wisden’s ball has pitched, though its pace is quicker, the distance it has to come is so much longer, that Clarke, in effect, is not so much slower, as he may appear. Lillywhite and Hillyer are of a medium kind; having partly the quickness of Wisden’s pace, and partly the advantage of Clarke’s curved lines and near pitch. From this diagram it appears that the slower the bowling the nearer it may be pitched, and the less the space the bat can cover; also, the more difficult is the ball to judge; for, the curved line of a dropping ball is very deceiving to the eye.

In speaking of Clarke’s bowling, men commonly imply that the slowness is its only difficulty. Now a ball cannot be more difficult for hand or eye because it moves slowly. No; the slower the easier; but the difficulty arises from the following qualities, wholly distinct from the pace, though certainly it is the slowness that renders those qualities possible:—

1st. Clarke’s lengths are more accurate.

2dly. He can vary his pace unobserved, without varying his action or delivery.

3dly. More of his balls would hit the wicket.

4thly. A slow ball must be played: it will not play itself.

5thly. Clarke can more readily take advantage of each man’s weak point.

6thly. Slow bowling admits of more bias.

7thly. The length is more difficult to judge, owing to the curved lines.

8thly. It requires the greatest accuracy in hitting. You must play at the ball with short, quick action where it actually is, and not by calculation of its rise, or where it will be.

9thly. Slow balls can be pitched nearer to the bat, affording a shorter sight of the rise.

10thly. Catches and chances of stumping are more frequent, and less likely to be missed.

11thly. The curved lines and the straightness preclude cutting, and render it dangerous to cross the ball in playing to leg.

One artifice of Clarke, and of all good slow bowlers, is this: to begin with a ball or two which may easily be played back; then, with a much higher toss and slower pace, as in the diagram, he pitches a little short of the usual spot. If the batsman’s eye is deceived as to the distance, he at once plays forward to a length which is at all times dangerous; and, as it rises higher, the play becomes more dangerous still.

The difficulty of “going in” to such bowling as Clarke’s, depends on this:—

The bat is only four inches and a quarter wide: call half that width two inches of wood. Then, you can only have two inches to spare for the deviation of your hit; therefore, if a ball turns about two inches, while you are in the act of hitting, the truest hitter possible must miss.

The obvious conclusion from these facts is,—

1st. That you can safely go in to such balls only as are straight, otherwise you cannot present a full bat; and, only when you can step right up to the pitch of the ball, otherwise, by a twist it will escape you; and slow balls turn more than fast in a given space. 2ndly. You can only go in to such lengths as you can easily and steadily command: a very long step, or any unusual hurry, will hardly be safe with only the said two inches of wood to spare.

Now the question is, with what lengths, against such bowling as Clarke’s, can you step in steadily and safely, both as far as the pitch, and with full command of hand and eye? Remember, you cannot begin your step till you have judged the length; and this, with the curved line of a slow dropping ball, you cannot judge till within a little of its grounding; so, the critical time for decision and action is very brief, and, in that brief space, how far can you step secure of all optical illusions, for, Clarke can deceive you by varying both the pace and the curve of his ball?—Go and try. Again, when you have stepped in, where will you hit? On the ground, of course, and straight. And where are the men placed? Besides, are you aware of the difficulty of interchanging the steady game with right foot in your ground, with that springy and spasmodic impulse which characterises this “going in?” At a match at Lord’s in 1849, I saw Brockwell score some forty runs with many hits off Clarke: he said to me, when he came out, “Clarke cannot bowl his best to me; for, sometimes, I go in to the pitch of the ball, when pitched well up, and hit her away; at other times, I make a feint, and then stand back, and so Clarke gets off his bowling.” He added, “the difficulty is to keep your temper and not to go in with a wrong ball.” This, I believe, is indeed a difficulty,—a much greater difficulty than is commonly imagined. My advice to all players who have not made a study of the art of going in, and have not fully succeeded on practising days, is, by no means to attempt it in a match. It is not so easy as it appears. You will find Clarke, or any good slow bowler, too much for you.—“But, supposing I should stand out of my ground, or start before the ball is out of the bowler’s hand?” Why, with an unpractised bowler, especially if in the constrained attitude of the overhand delivery, this manœuvre has succeeded in producing threes and fours in rapid succession. But Clarke would pitch over your head, or send in a quick underhand ball a little wide, and you would be stumped; and Wisden would probably send a fast toss about the height of your shoulder, and, being prepared to play perfectly straight at the pitch, you would hardly raise your bat in time to keep a swift toss out of the wicket-keeper’s hands.

The difficulty of curvilinear bowling is this:—

1st. As in making a catch, every fieldsman finds that, in proportion as the ball has been hit up in the air, it is difficult to judge where to place himself: by the same law of sight, a fast ball that goes almost point-blank to its pitch, is far easier to judge than a slow ball that descends in a curve.

2ndly. As the slow ball reaches the ground at a greater angle, it must rise higher in a given space; so, if the batsman misjudges the pitch of a slow ball by a foot, he will misjudge the rise to a greater extent than with a fast ball, which rises less abruptly. Hence, playing forward is less easy with slow, than with fast, bowling.

3dly. As to timing the ball, all the eye can discern in a body moving directly towards it, is the angle with the ground: to see the curve of a dropping ball you must have a side view. The man at Point can see the curve clearly; but not so the batsman. Consequently, the effect of the curve is left out in the calculation, and the exact time of the ball’s approach is, to that extent, mistaken. Every one knows the difficulty of making a good half-volley-hit off a slow ball, because the timing is so difficult: great speed without a curve is less puzzling to the eye than a curvilinear movement, however slow. It were odd, indeed, if it were harder to hit a slow than a fast ball. No. It is the curve that makes difficult what of its pace alone would be easy. All forward play, with slow bowling, is beset with the great difficulty of allowing for the curve. And what style of play does this suggest? Why, precisely what Clarke has himself remarked,—namely, that to fix the right foot as for fast bowling, and play with long reach forward, does not answer. You must be quick on your feet, and, by short quick action of the arms, hit the ball actually as it is, and not as you calculate it will be a second later. This is the system of men who play Clarke best; of Mr. Vernon, of Fuller Pilch, of Hunt of Sheffield, and of C. Browne: though these men also dodge Clarke; and, pretending sometimes to go out, deceive him into dropping short, and so play their heads against his. The best bowling is sometimes hit; but I have not heard of any man who found it much easier to score off Clarke than off other good bowlers. To play Clarke “on any foregone conclusion” is fatal. Every ball must be judged by its respective merits and played accordingly.

Again, as to cutting, or in any way crossing, these dropping or curvilinear balls. As a slow ball rises twice as much in a given space as a fast ball, of course the chances are greater that the bat will not cover the ball at the point at which, by anticipation, you cut. If you cut at a fast ball, the height of its rise is nearly uniform, and its course a straight line: so, most men like very fast bowling, because, if the hand is quick enough, the judgment is not easily deceived, for the ball moves nearly in straight lines. But, in cutting or in crossing a slow ball, the height of the rise varies enough to produce a mistake while the bat is descending on the ball.

Once more, in playing at a ball after its rise, a safe and forcible hit can only be made in two ways. You must either meet the ball with full and straight bat, or cut horizontally across it. Now, as slow balls generally rise too high for a hard hit with perpendicular bat, you are reduced generally to the difficulties of cutting or back play. Add to all this, that the bias from the hand and from the inequalities of the ground is much greater, and also that a catch, resulting from a feeble hit and the ball spinning off the edge of the bat, remains commonly so long in the air that every fieldsman can cover double his usual quantity of ground, and then we shall cease to wonder that the best players cannot score fast off slow bowling.

CHAP. IX.
BOWLING.—AN HOUR WITH “OLD CLARKE.”

In cricket wisdom Clarke is truly “Old:” what he has learnt from anybody, he learnt from Lambert. But he is a man who thinks for himself, and knows men and manners, and has many wily devices, “splendidè mendax.” “I beg your pardon, sir,” he one day said to a gentleman taking guard, “but ain’t you Harrow?”—“Then we shan’t want a man down there,” he said, addressing a fieldsman; “stand for the ‘Harrow drive,’ between point and middle wicket.”

The time to see Clarke is on the morning of a match. While others are practising, he walks round with his hands under the flaps of his coat, reconnoitring his adversaries’ wicket.

“Before you bowl to a man, it is worth something to know what is running in his head. That gentleman,” he will say, “is too fast on his feet, so, as good as ready money to me: if he doesn’t hit he can’t score; if he does I shall have him directly.”

Going a little further, he sees a man lobbing to another, who is practising stepping in. “There, sir, is ‘practising to play Clarke,’ that is very plain; and a nice mess, you will see, he will make of it. Ah! my friend, if you do go in at all, you must go in further than that, or my twist will beat you; and, going in to swipe round, eh! Learn to run me down with a straight bat, and I will say something to you. But that wouldn’t score quite fast enough for your notions. Going in to hit round is a tempting of Providence.”

“There, that man is purely stupid: alter the pace and height with a dropping ball, and I shall have no trouble with him. They think, sir, it is nothing but ‘Clarke’s vexatious pace:’ they know nothing about the curves. With fast bowling, you cannot have half my variety; and when you have found out the weak point, where’s the fast bowler that can give the exact ball to hit it? There is often no more head-work in fast bowling than there is in the catapult: without head-work I should be hit out of the field.”

“A man is never more taken aback than when he prepares for one ball, and I bowl him the contrary one: there was Mr. Nameless, the first time he came to Nottingham, full of fancies about playing me. The first ball, he walked some yards out to meet me, and I pitched over his head, so near his wicket, that, thought I, that bird won’t fight again. Next ball, he was a little cunning, and made a feint of coming out, meaning, as I guessed, to stand back for a long hop; so I pitched right up to him; and he was so bent upon cutting me away, that he hit his own wicket down!”

Look at diagrams page 179. Clarke is there represented as bowling two balls of different lengths; but the increased height of the shorter pitched ball, by a natural ocular delusion, makes it appear as far pitched as the other. If the batsman is deceived in playing at both balls by the same forward play, he endangers his wicket. “See, there,” continues Clarke, “that gentleman’s is a dodge certainly, but not a new one either. He does step in, it is true; but while hitting at the ball, he is so anxious about getting back again, that his position has all the danger of stepping in, and none of its advantages.”

“Then there is Mr. ——,” naming a great man struggling with adversity. “He gives a jump up off his feet, and thinks he is stepping in, but comes flump down just where he was before.”

“Pilch plays me better than any one. But he knows better than to step in to every ball, or to stand fast every ball. He plays steadily, and discriminates, waiting till I give him a chance, and then makes the most of it.”

Bowling consists of two parts: there is the mechanical part, and the intellectual part. First, you want the hand to pitch where you please, and then the head to know where to pitch, according to the player.

To learn the Art of Bowling.—1. First, consult with some Lillywhite or Wisden, and fix on one, and one only, plan of holding the ball, manageable pace, and general style of delivery. Consult and experiment till you have chosen the style that suits the play of your muscles and your strength. If you choose a violent and laborious style, you will certainly become tired of it: but a style within your strength will be so delightful that you will be always practising. Secondly, having definitely chosen one form and style of bowling, the next thing is to fix it and form it into a habit: for, on the law of Habit a bowler’s accuracy entirely depends.

To form a steady habit of bowling, the nerves and muscles being a very delicate machinery, you must be careful to use them in one way, and one way only; for then they will come to serve you truly and mechanically: but, even a few hours spent in loose play—in bowling with few steps or many, or with a new mode of delivery—will often establish conflicting habits, or call into action a new set of muscles, to interfere with the muscles on which you mainly depend. Many good players (including the most destructive of the Gentleman’s Eleven!) have lost their bowling by these experiments: many more have been thrown back when near perfection. Therefore,

2. Never bowl a single ball but in your chosen and adopted form and style—with the same steps, and with the ball held in the same way. “If these seem small things, habit is not a small thing.” Also, never go on when you are too tired to command your muscles; else, you will be twisting yourself out of form, and calling new and conflicting muscles into action.

As to Pace, if your strength and stature is little, your pace cannot be fast. Be contented with being rather a slow bowler. By commencing slowly, if any pace is in you, it will not be lost; but by commencing fast, you will spoil all.

3. Let your carriage be upright though easy; and start composedly from a state of perfect rest. Let your steps, especially the last, be short; and, for firm foothold, and to avoid shaking yourself or cutting up the ground, learn to descend not on the heel but more on the toe and flat of the foot, and so as to have both feet in the line of the opposite wicket. For,

4. A golden rule for straight bowling is to present, at delivery, a full face to the opposite wicket; the shoulders being in the same line, or parallel with, the crease. That is the moment to quit the ball—a moment sooner and you will bowl wide to the leg, a moment later and you will bowl wide to the Off. Observe Wisden and Hillyer. They deliver just as their front is square with the opposite wicket. They look well at their mark, and bowl before they have swung too far round for the line of sight to be out of the line of the wicket. Observe, also, bad bowlers, and you will see a uniformity in their deviation: some bowl regularly too much to the On; others as regularly to the Off. Then, watch their shoulders; and you will recognise a corresponding error in their delivery. The wonder is that such men should ever bowl straight.

Also, adopt a run of from five to seven yards. Let your run be quite straight; not from side to side, still less crossing your legs as you run.

5. “Practise,” says Lillywhite, “both sides of the wicket. To be able to change sides, is highly useful when the ground is worn, and it often proves puzzling to the batsman.”

6. Hold the ball in the fingers, not in the palm, and always the same way. If the tips of the fingers touch the seam of the ball, it will assist in the spin. The little finger “guides” the ball in the delivery.

7. The essence of a good delivery is to send the ball forth rotating, or turning on its own axis. The more spin you give the ball, the better the delivery; because then the ball will twist, rise quickly, or cut variously, the instant it touches the ground.

8. This spin must not proceed from any conscious action of the fingers, but from some mechanical action of the arm and wrist. Clarke is not conscious of any attempt to make his ball spin or twist: a certain action has become habitual to him. He may endeavour to increase this tendency sometimes; but no bowling could be uniform that depended so much on the nerves, or on such nice feeling as this attention to the fingers would involve. A bowler must acquire a certain mechanical swing, with measured steps and uniform action and carriage of the body, till at length, as with a gun, hand and eye naturally go together. In rowing, if you look at your oar, you cut crabs. In skating, if you look at the ice and think of your steps, you lose the freedom and the flow of your circles. So, with bowling, having decided on your steps and one mode of delivery, you must practise this alone, and think more of the wicket than of your feet or your hand.

To assist the spin of the ball, a good bowler will not stop short, but will rather follow the ball, or, give way to it, after delivery, for one or two steps. Some bowlers even continue the twisting action of the hand after the ball has left it.

9. Commence with a very low delivery. Cobbett, and others of the best bowlers, began underhand. The lower the hand, the more the spin, and the quicker the rise. Unfair or throwing bowlers never have a first-rate delivery. See how easy to play is a throw, or a ball from a catapult; and simply because the ball has then no spin. Redgate showed how bowling may be most fair and most effective. No man ever took Pilch’s wicket so often. His delivery was easy and natural; he had a thorough command of his arm, and gave great spin to the ball. In Kent against England, at Town Malling, he bowled the finest Over on record. The first ball just grazed Pilch’s wicket; the second took his bails; the third ball levelled Mynn, and the fourth Stearman; three of the best bats of the day.

10. Practise a little and often. If you over-fatigue the muscles, you spoil their tone for a time. Bowling, as we said of batting, must become a matter of habit; and habits are formed by frequent repetition. Let the bowlers of Eton, Harrow, and Winchester resolve to bowl, if it be but a dozen balls, every day, wet or fine. Intermission is very prejudicial.

11. The difficulty is to pitch far enough. Commence, according to your strength, eighteen or nineteen yards, and increase to twenty-two by degrees. Most amateurs bowl long hops.

12. Seek accuracy more than speed: a man of fourteen stone is not to be imitated by a youth of eight stone. Many batsmen like swift bowling, and why? Because the length is easier to judge; the lines are straighter for a cut; the ball wants little accuracy of hitting; fast bowlers very rarely pitch quite as far even as they might, for this requires much extra power; fast balls twist less in a given space than slow balls, and rarely increase their speed at the rise in the same proportion as slow balls; fast bowling gives fewer chances that the fieldsman can take advantage of, and admits generally of less variety; fewer fast balls are pitched straight, and fewer even of those would hit the wicket. You may find a Redgate, a Wisden, or a Mynn, who can bring fast bowling under command for one or two seasons; but these are exceptions too solitary to afford a precedent. Even these men were naturally of a fast pace: swiftness was not their chief object. So, study accurate bowling, and let speed come of itself.

So much for attaining the power of a bowler; next to apply it. Not only practise, but study bowling: to pelt away mechanically, with the same lengths and same pace, is excusable in a catapult, but not in a man.—Can your adversary guard leg-stump or off-stump? Can he judge a length? Can he allow for a curve? Can he play well over an off-ball to prevent a catch? Can you deceive him with time or pace? Is he a young gentleman, or an old gentleman?—