THE CHINA MAIL, FEBRUARY 16, 1938.
DOES GAME OF GOLF AFFECT
ONE'S BATTING?
RE
MISSED CATCHES THAT COUNT TO FIELDSMEN
(By J. C. DAVIS)
Sydney, December 16. EMARKING on a recent tendency (before getting the eye in) by some able batsmen to hit across a ball pitched well up with a bit of leg spin or swerve on it to an international cricketer, he said that he too, had noticed it. "Just a passing phase," he observed. He thought it would pass as suddenly as it had appeared.
“I THINK IT IS DUE TO THEIR MIXING GOLF AND CRICKET. SOME BATSMEN POSSESS GENIUS WHICH MAKES THEM RISE SUPERIOR TO THESE THINGS. OF SUCH ARE BRADMAN, MCCABE, AND MACARTNEY. IT DOES NOT SEEM TO MATTER TO THEM WHETHER THEY MIX GOLF AND CRICKET, THEY GET THE RUNS JUST THE SAME IN THEIR OWN INIMITABLE STYLE. “NEVERTHELESS,” HE SAID, “THE STROKES IN GOLF AND CRICKET, THE GRIP, OR THE BAT AND THE CLUB ARE SO DIFFERENT THAT I DO NOT THINK YOUR STAR CRICKETER SHOULD MIX GOLF IN THE CRICKET SEASON WITH HIS CRICKET. I'M SURE IT DOES HIS CRICKET NO GOOD. HE SHOULD CONFINE HIMSELF TO CRICKET IN ITS SEASON, AND PUT IN HIS WINTER PLAYING GOLF.”
Hitting across the line of the ball referred to has, perhaps, nothing to do with mixing golf with cricket. It is, of course, not general. It is probably due to a slight weakening in concen- tration on keeping the left elbow straight and with it, the bat knights of the little red ball were not straight. The safer and more known. prolific stroke is to give the ball w.G., "on which I played a round of "One of the earliest occasions," said the face of the perpendicular bat golf, was with Billy Murdoch, Nobody with power behind it.
was fonder of a bit of fun. And a We hear many opinions on the effect more cheery, genial companion, under of mixing golf and cricket. Some con all circumstances, there surely never tend that it is very bad for the cric-was than Billy Murdoch. keter. Some that it is very bad for the golfer. Perhaps no hard and fast rule can be applied. No two men are alike. What may be meat for one may be poison to another.
AS RELAXATION
a
of Yorkshire. Dick Lilley, the Eng- land wicketkeeper, thus described the event:
some
"It was during this innings that Len Braund made the most wonderful catch in the slips I have ever seen, when he caught Clem Hill off Hirst's bowling. Hill had actually played the ball ∙to fine-leg. when Braund, fielding at fine slip, covered such an extraordinary two strides to the leg-side behind me amount of ground that he got and brought off a phenomenal catch. believe that an apparently safe stroke which should have gone to the bound- arý had, in fact cost him his wicket.
"Braund, himself, was most modest about it. He explained that he was watching my movements, ‘AS I MADE A MOVE WHICH SUGGESTED THAT THE BALL WOULD BE PLAYED TO THE LEG-SIDE, HE AT ONCE MOV- ED THAT WAY, TOO, AND EX- TENDING HIS ARM: AT FULL LENGTH FOUND THE BALL IN HIS HAND.".
"Mr. Hill was amazed and could not
The, other catch was taken by Clem Hill in the Manchester Test that year. Lilley was the batsman. England re- quiring only 124 to win in their last innings, was close to success. Dick Lilley again tells the story:—
made twelfth man in the next Test "When I was at the wickets together team. His name was Don Bradman, with Rhodes, we got within eight runs who very soon proved-on being rein- of victory. I then made a big square- stated in the Test team-that he was leg hit off Trumble, Hill, fielding on -not-only one of the then best batsmen the boundary, started off at full speed. of the day, but one of the finest out- It did not seem possible at first to fields seen since Vernon Ransford's hey make the catch, but the wind seemed day. Since then he has shown that he to get under the ball, slightly turning is the world's greatest outfield as well it in its flight as batsman.
Hill brought off a splendid catch while running at full The opposite to this can be quoted. speed. Tate was the last man in, but once take a ball on the hop that should bowled by Saunders, and England had I have seen a Test fieldsman more than after making a hit to leg for four was have been a catch.
lost a most exciting match by three There is a moral in this to the cric-runs." keter. Never fear missing a catch in Fred Tate was the father of Maurice the effort to bring off a difficult one, Tate, our later hero, even though it may mean adding the Others have described the Clem Hill boundary to the score.
catch as one of the most remarkable IT IS AMAZING WHAT A FIELDS. lever seen in first-class cricket. MAN CAN CATCH IF HE BUT GOES this match for Australia, ALL OUT FOR IT.
RUSH FOR LEEDS TEST TICKETS
Two Test catches in which Clem Hill
Although applications for was concerned come to mind to illus-served seats for the Test match at
When the Australians
BILLY MURDOCH IN BUNKER "We were digging our way round when Murdoch drove into a deep sand- bunker rather at the side of the course. A few spectators were, with us, but Catches are made at times when Billy got into the bunker he was astonish the man who made them more that hidden from view.
We saw the ball even than his colleagues and the spec- come out with the usual shower of tators. sand, and everyone cried, "Well out. Good shot!?
It won
- re-
brought off a phenomenal catch in the tralia next July were considered were in England in 1902 Len Braund Leeds between England and Aus-
lians collapsed on a good wicket for 36 Birmingham Test in which the Austra-only after last Tuesday, all the 800 against
have been
A great many years ago, when golf was a "young" game in this country, few cricketers took it on. It was the same in England. But as it became better known, and more generally play- ed, many cricketers took it up as relaxation from the concentration of first-class cricket. That was
in England. Hence we often heard of the Hon. F. S. Jackson, G. W. Beldham, George Brann, R. E. Foster, G. L. Jes- sop, H. D. G. Leveson-Gower, and A. E. Stoddart all playing golf very well. Some of these, of course, had a special gift for games. Stoddart, for instance, was a wonderful three-quarter back in Rugby Union football. And R. E. Foster was an adept at Soccer football. However, most cricketers of a past generation who took up golf did so when they were relaxing from the more arduous cricket playing, Or retiring balmy in a bunker." from the game. It was so with W. G. Grace and W. L. Murdoch. With cric-golf evidently, does a batsman little or
"At lunch one of the members of thetrate the point. club remarked on Billy's excellent re- covery, saying he'd soon be a plus man at that rate.
"Billy, having taken it all in quite seriously, whispered to me, 'Knew I would never get out of the blessed hole, so I took a double handful of sand and the ball, and flung 'em out."
keters these times it is different.
WE KNOW THAT DON BRAD- MAN AND STAN McCABE ARE VERY KEEN ON GOLF, SO IS ALAN
FACT, KIPPAX. IN “KIPPIE,” IN HIS GREATEST CRICKETING YEARS, FOUND GOLF GO HAND IN HAND WITH CRICKET.
To-day he is not playing cricket (though he may take it up again) but he is playing golf very keenly, and quite well.
"But Billy created great fun on an- other occasion at Rye. He was play- ing a round with another cricketer on a very hot day. Billy came in alone, after the round was finished, to the luncheon room. I said to him, “What have you done with your partner, Billy? 'Oh,' he gasped, I left him
If one does not take it too seriously,
no harm. At all events, when the Aus- tralians are touring England these days you will generally find a number of them spending their Sundays at some inviting, golf centre, getting any amount of fun with the clubs in con-. genial company. They find it relaxing.
A peculiar question was put to me the other day. If the fieldsman touches the ball with his hands is it a chance? Perhaps it is. There is not and never can be a worth-while rule on the sub- ject. We have all scen fieldsmen make NO GOLF COURSE
valiant efforts to bring off the catch W. G. Grace did not play any golf in and fail, and hear it quoted as a blem- the hey-day of his wonderful career in ish against them. It may be a blemish cricket. He thought this was due, perto those of-statistical mind, while to haps, to the fact that, in his part of the cricketer it may win the maximum Gloucestershire, there was no golf points for merit. course. When he was getting old în cricket, he did play golf.
WHEN DON BRADMAN
· WAS A YOUNGSTER
W. G. was once asked the inevitable question as to whether golf was bad I once heard one who had figured in for cricket. His experience led him to first-class cricket-criticising a young unhesitatingly reply that it wasn't. ** fleldsman in a Test because he did not BUT, MARK YOU, W.G. THOUGHT nail a very difficult, low, fast out-field CRICKET · WAS NOT GOOD FOR chance while running very close to the GOLF!
pickets. The speaker was giving this
He said that if a golfer wished to as one of a few reasons why the young play well he should not play cricket cricketer should be dropped from the one day and golf the next; and expect Test eleven. I thought it no miss at to feel perfectly at home with his all, and said that the youngster with clubs.
speed of thought and feet, and the right W.G. got plenty of relaxation and team-spirit had made a great effort to some exercise and good fellowship out bring off a catch that no other man of golf. One of his stories brings in on the side would have got near.
a
an Australian of whom we know - а My friend, while not questioning the great deal, though he belongs to period when the Bradmans. McCabes, Oldfields, Ponsfords, and other modern
latter fact, held to his view. He was utterly wrong.
The young player referred to was
Rhodes, the fast and slow left-handers sold.
George Hirst and Wilfred higher-priced tickets
Budweise
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FOR
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"THE KING OF CANNED BEERS”
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