Chapter III: Bowling: by A. G. Steel (2)

Let us now turn to another element of good bowling--change of pace. It does not require any great amount of technical cricket knowledge to understand that, if a bowler delivers every ball at the same uniform pace, his bowling is easier for a batsman to judge and play than when he is continually altering and changing the pace. If a batsman misjudges the pace of the ball he often loses his wicket. If he plays too slow for a fast ball, or too fast for a slow one, he generally makes a fatal mistake. As it is necessary for a shooter to accurately judge the pace of a driven grouse before pulling the trigger, so is it equally necessary for a batsman to judge the pace of the ball before he plays to it. This power of judging pace only comes after long experience; but when it does exist it seems to be exercised almost intuitively, and without any conscious thought--indeed there is often no time for thought.

Perhaps the one thing which made Mr. Spofforth, the famous Australian bowler, superior at his best to all others, and has earned him the reputation of being the best bowler that has ever lived, was his wonderful power of changing the pace of the ball without making it perceptible to the batsman. In his bowling the same run, action, and exertion were apparently used for delivering a slow or medium-paced ball as for a fast one. Many a time, especially on his first arrival in England, when this bowling was strange to our batsmen, the ball seemed to dislodge the bails long after the bat had completed the stroke, and was perhaps high in the air. Change of pace, to be effective, must not mean change of action; and the first thing a bowler who wishes to practise this art must understand, is that the slightest variation in style or action for a slower or faster ball will at once put the batsman on the _qui vive_ and destroy the effect of the device.

C. T. B. Turner, the Australian bowler, was a great adept at changing the pace of the ball without sounding any warning note to the batsman. He is one of the very finest bowlers we have ever seen bowl; he has great command over the ball, and a beautiful and easy delivery. His performances in this country have been wonderful; the only defect in his bowling which, in the writer’s opinion, keeps him from being considered Spofforth’s equal is that his action is too easy to see. A good batsman is not so likely to be deceived by him as readily as by Spofforth’s windmill deliveries.

When a slow or medium-pace bowler wishes to deceive the batsman by a change of pace, he has, of course, two courses open to him--either to accelerate the speed of the ball or diminish it. When he wishes to bowl a faster ball than usual, he must remember that the object of the experiment is to make the batsman play slower to the ball than he has been doing, and that this result will be far more easily accomplished by pitching a good-length--if anything, a little further than a good-length--ball, than by a short one. If the latter is bowled, the batsman, although deceived in the pace up to the pitch, has time to discover his mistake before the ball reaches him, and consequently has his bat ready in time to stop it. If a ball is, however, pitched a good length, or a trifle beyond it, and up to the pitch is successful in deceiving the batsman, he will not have much chance of stopping it afterwards.

Palmer, another of the famous Australians, sends down the best fast ball that has been seen from a medium-pace bowler. There is no change of action to warn the batsman, no longer or faster run, but the ball comes with lightning rapidity, generally pitched well up, and very often in the block-hole, making that most deadly ball a ‘fast yorker,’ about which something will be said farther on. The change from slow or medium-pace bowling to quite slow is much more frequently practised than the change to fast, and consequently we may presume it is more easy of accomplishment. There are few slow or medium-pace bowlers who do not try occasionally to deceive the batsman by making the high slow ball pitch a little shorter than the rest have been doing. But although there are many bowlers who endeavour thus to deceive, there are but few who are really skilful in the art.

It is an extremely difficult thing to reduce the pace on the ball without altering the action. Mr. Spofforth, the Australian, as we have observed, excelled in this, as also did Alfred Shaw, of Nottingham, when at his best. For many years Shaw had the reputation of being the best slow bowler in England, and justly so. His most deadly device was, after he had bowled three or four of his ordinary paced ones, to toss the ball a little higher, a little slower, and a little shorter. Unless the batsman detected the alteration in speed at the moment of delivery, he made what was often a fatal mistake. If he hit, the ball would go high in the air, generally in the direction of deep field-on; if he played forward, a catch and bowl was the very likely result. If this ball is bowled without deceiving the batsman, it generally meets with a very heavy penalty, as, if rightly judged at first, it can generally be either waited for and hit almost to any part of the field on the ‘long-hop’ or bound, or run down and driven past the bowler; but the latter feat can only be accomplished by batsmen who are very quick on their legs.

Some of the best exponents of this ball appear, just prior to delivery, to greatly exert their bodies, and go through their whole customary action, while the arm, dragged slower than usual through the air, delivers the ball when the body is comparatively at rest. This, no doubt, gives the batsman the idea that the ball is going to be delivered before it really does leave the bowler’s hand. But it would be quite beyond the capabilities of the writer to furnish any intelligible hints as to how to bowl this ball; every bowler will with practice find this out for himself.

As a rule, good bowlers of the present day bowl with their arms above the shoulder, and it is a rudiment in the art that the action of delivery should be as high as possible. The high delivery is certainly the most successful where the ground is hard, fast, and true, as then little or no twist can be put on to the ball, and the higher it is made to bound the more chance there is of the batsman making an uppish stroke. In addition to this advantage which the high has over the low delivery, the higher the arm is raised above the shoulder the more difficult it is for a batsman to judge the pitch and flight of the ball.

With regard to the amount of success that slow and fast bowling meet with, a great deal depends on the state of the ground, but speaking of England, and on hard wickets, fast bowlers are having the best of it; at any rate, Richardson is far the most deadly, while Mold, Hearne, Davidson, Bland, Cuttell, and Hirst are very successful. In a later chapter, however, the causes are discussed which seem to show that head bowlers, bowlers who change their pace and methods, will have to be the bowlers of the future. But it is also true, as a general rule, that slow bowling is more difficult to play than fast. The advantages that it possesses over fast are as follows:--

First.--The slowly delivered ball describes a curved line in the air both before it pitches and afterwards to the bat; and balls coming in a curved line are far more difficult to play accurately than those which come quick and straight from the pitch. If the batsman properly judged the fast ball, by simply putting his bat straight forward he would always meet and stop it. It is not quite so with the slower ball. The ball, coming on to the ground in a curve, will leave it in a curve, and may consequently go over the shoulder of the bat. Besides, the quicker the ball is, the shorter time the batsman has to play it; his mode of playing must be decided on instantaneously, so he has no time to get into two minds on the subject.

Secondly.--In slow bowling there is always more actual hitting than in fast, and the more hitting the greater chance there is of the ball going up in the air. Fast bowling may perhaps be driven more--that is to say, it may be pushed hard by good forward play in front of the wicket in all directions; but it is not often with this style of bowling that the bat is lifted high in the air, and the shoulders, arms, and whole body combine together for a big hit or ‘slog,’ as it is sometimes called, whereas slows often tempt the best of batsmen to hit without quite getting on to the pitch of the ball, the consequence being that the ball goes up in the air somewhere.

It is a very common occurrence to see a slow bowler who is bowling really well, and with tolerable success, taken off at once on the advent of some batsman who has earned a reputation for big hitting. He himself may be nervous about the fearful smashing the batsman may give him, and suggest to his captain to put on some fast bowler in his place, or else the captain may make the change himself. What is the usual result? The fast bowler compels the hitter to play a steady game, and then, when the latter has just got his eye well set and fit for hitting, on go the slows again, with the probable result of being utterly knocked to pieces in a few overs. If the slows had been allowed a chance at first, when the batsman’s eye had not got settled down to the light, and he himself was still suffering from the nervousness inevitable to every man on first going in, what a different tale might have been told! It is always the best thing to put on slows to a big hitter when he first comes in. His anxiety to begin to hit at once is fostered by the slow, easy-looking balls that give him such time to lift his bat and put his whole strength into the stroke; this anxiety is often helped, too, by his nervousness, which in many instances produces a tendency to hit.

On a certain occasion one of the biggest hitters our cricket grounds have ever seen made about eighty runs without having a single slow ball bowled to him. The captain at last put on a slow bowler out of sheer desperation. As the slow bowler walked up to the wicket to bowl, the big hitter turned to him and said, ‘What, are _you_ going to bowl your donkey-drops? I’ll hit them all out of the ground.’ ‘If you _keep on_ doing it I shall have to go off,’ was the modest reply. The third ball of the over there was a terrific slog; the bat fairly whistled with the speed it went through the air, and the ball, touching the shoulder, landed in short-slip’s hands.

There are only two exceptions to the golden rule to put on slows when a hitter first comes in: the first is when there is something peculiar connected with the condition of the ground which is making a fast bowler at that particular time especially deadly; and the second, when the condition of the game renders it imperatively necessary to keep down the runs at all costs. In the latter case a slow bowler may prove too expensive, as even the miss-hits of a strong hitter are apt to go to the boundary.

Thirdly (to resume the consideration of the advantages of slow bowling, interrupted by the anecdote and the statement of the rule and its exceptions).--Slow bowling offers more opportunity to the wicket-keeper for stumping than fast. It is so tempting for a batsman to rush in and drive the slow tossed-up ball that often he chooses the wrong one, misses it, and is left standing still a yard or two out of his ground. Chances to the wicket-keeper are also much easier off slows than fast, and consequently a great many more wickets are taken.

Fourthly.--The very slowness of the ball induces liberties of all sorts to be taken, besides that of hitting mentioned above. The batsman, when his eye is well in, often tries to score by placing balls to a particular spot, which their pitch does not justify. A favourite error that even the best batsmen fall into is that of trying to hit the leg-stump half-volleys too much to the on side, and sometimes absolutely to leg, a stroke which would never enter his head were a fast bowler bowling.

Fifthly.--A slow bowler has much greater command of pitch, pace, and spin than a fast one. The power which is expended by the latter on the pace of the ball is available by the former for these more subtle devices. There is consequently a much wider field for experiment open to the slow bowler. Usually a fast bowler bowls away ball after ball in the hopes of breaking down the batsman’s defence by a good-length ball or a ‘yorker;’ if he fails to do this he retires in favour of the next change. A slow bowler has many devices, of which actually bowling the batsman out is perhaps very seldom resorted to. He should be able to pitch the ball within a few inches of the spot he wishes, and thus, when he has ascertained any particular weakness the batsman seems to possess, he is able to take advantage of it. There are very few batsmen who have not certain favourite strokes; some may have a partiality for cutting, others for playing on the on side for ones and twos, others for off driving; but whatever the particular _penchant_ may be, a slow bowler’s business is to make himself acquainted with it and then take the greatest possible advantage of it. Suppose a batsman shows by his play that he is always on the look-out for a cut, and even goes so far as to cut balls which should be driven or played forward to, on the off side, a slow bowler by his command of pitch and pace may do much execution. A ball pitched a trifle further up than usual on the off side and a trifle faster may, and often does, induce the batsman to try his favourite stroke, at the imminent peril of placing the ball in the hands of point or third man, or of being caught at the wicket. A slower and higher ball than usual pitched on the leg-stump will often induce a batsman to try a favourite ‘on side’ stroke, at the risk of playing with a cross bat and being bowled or out leg before wicket. In fact, every fault that it is possible for a batsman to possess may be taken advantage of by a slow bowler to a much greater extent than by one of great pace. How often one sees a batsman who has given great trouble dismissed by a slow bowler who seems to have absolutely no merit whatever! The ball is tossed high in the air with apparently no spin of any sort, and so slow as hardly to reach the wicket, and yet the well-set batsman falls a prey to his over-anxiety to play the ball where the pitch of it does not warrant.

Sixthly.--A slow bowler has the advantage over a fast one of having what is equivalent to an extra man in the field, viz. himself. After the ball is bowled he is firm on his legs, ready to run in for a catch and bowl, or to dart to the on or the off side as the batsman shapes to play the ball. No matter how hard the ball is returned from the bat, he has always ample time to get down with the right hand or the left or to jump high in the air; when the batsmen are running he is always able to get behind his wickets ready to receive the ball when returned by the fielder, a golden rule for every bowler which is too often neglected. A fast bowler is generally unsteady on his legs after the ball is delivered; the pace with which he runs up to the wicket carries him on a few paces after the delivery, and he is thus generally unable to exhibit the same activity and sharpness in fielding his own bowling as a slow bowler does. In days gone by, when grounds were bad and rough, slow bowling was not so successful as fast, but the general improvement in the ground has altered this.

And now, having seen some of the advantages slow bowling possesses over fast, and before discussing the latter’s merits, let us see on what principles a slow bowler should endeavour to bowl, and what rules he should follow in order to attain success. Whilst speaking of slow bowling we shall refer to any pace under that of medium, as the rules and principles of medium are included in what is said on fast bowling. Perhaps the most important thing that every bowler, whether fast, medium, or slow, should realise is, as we have said before, to keep the ball well pitched up when a batsman first comes in. The importance of this rule is manifest, as a short-pitched ball requires no play, whereas one pitched a good length, or even farther, requires steadiness and accuracy of eye to play; because there is a moment after its pitch when it is lost to the vision, and consequently if the eye lacks accuracy the ball will be missed or bungled. An old professional cricketer, one who has made his mark in times gone by both with bat and ball, once observed to the author, ‘Anything rather than straight long-hops, sir, when a man first comes in; wides and full-pitches are better,’ and he was right; straight long-hops, which, alas! many of our professional bowlers bowl only too often, in order to prevent runs being made off them, do more to get in the eyes of batsmen than any other sort of ball. Often and often one sees a bowler, and perhaps one who has the name of being first-class, send down to a new batsman straight long-hops one after the other--balls which it is impossible, or nearly so, to score off, and then at the end of each over walk to his place with a thoroughly satisfied air, as if adding one more maiden over to his analysis had really helped his side on to the ultimate goal of victory. It is always better for a bowler to see a fresh batsman make half a dozen runs from well-pitched balls or half-volleys his first over than to see him stop four straight long-hops.

On the fall of a wicket the bowler should always remember that the new batsman is entirely unaccustomed to the light and not yet warm to his work, and that consequently the pet devices which may have been clearly seen through and mercilessly punished by the retiring batsman are for the present quite fresh for the new one. He should consequently begin by doing all he can to get rid of him at once before he gets ‘set.’ He should in the first two or three overs try every effective ball he knows--and certainly in the first over he should try a ‘yorker.’ This ball, called in days gone by a ‘tice,’ an abbreviation of ‘entice,’ is certainly one of the most deadly balls that can be bowled, if not absolutely the most deadly. We believe that, if statistics could be kept of how every wicket fell during the course of a season, more would be found victims to the ‘yorker’ than to any other ball. We can find no derivation for the word ‘yorker,’ but are told that it came from the Yorkshiremen, who were fonder of bowling this ball than any other. A story is told of a famous old Yorkshire professional who, on being asked whether he knew why this ball was called a ‘yorker,’ replied, ‘Of course I do.’ ‘Well?’ said his questioner. ‘Why, what else could you call it?’ was the answer, with a puzzled look and a scratch on the top of his head. The ordinary definition of a ‘yorker’ is a ball that pitches inside the crease, and this, no doubt, is correct so far as it goes, but it does not go far enough. It really should be, any ball that pitches directly underneath the bat. It is quite possible for a man to be bowled out with a ‘yorker’ when he is two or three yards out of his ground, if he misjudges the ball, and allows it to pitch directly beneath his bat, although the ball pitches as far from the crease as he is standing. The most deadly sort of ‘yorker,’ however, is the one that pitches about three or four inches inside the crease. One mistake which the batsman makes with this ball is that he imagines it is going to pitch shorter for a half-volley, and gets ready to hit, when he finds the ball coming farther than he expected, and is then too late to stop it. Another grave error which many batsmen fall into is that of lifting their bats up, after judging the pace and pitch of the ‘yorker,’ intending to come down on it as it touches the ground, which really is at the very last moment. It seems an easy thing to stop a ‘yorker’ in this way, but it really requires the greatest nicety in timing, and a moment late means that the ball has passed and the stumps are down. Whenever a batsman is playing ‘yorkers’ by chopping down on them inside his crease, it is as certain as can be that he is not at all at home with them, and the bowler may hope for success with every one he tries. Even if the bat does come down on a ‘yorker’ in the crease at the last moment, it often dribbles on with the spin, and just dislodges the bails. The only proper, workmanlike way to deal with ‘yorkers’ is to play them forward. The bat should be thrust forward directly the ball is seen to be right up to the batsman, and then it cannot fail to be stopped. One great peculiarity of ‘yorkers’ is that it is impossible to bowl such a ball to some batsmen. W. G. Grace hardly ever gets one; directly the ball leaves the bowler’s hand he sees its destination, viz. an inch inside the crease; he puts the bat out to meet the ball, and makes it one of the easiest possible, viz. a full-pitch. If there were no such thing as misjudgment on the part of a batsman, there would be no such thing as a ‘yorker.’ It depends for its very existence on being taken for something else. If every batsman were perfectly accurate in his sight and judgment of pitch, every so-called ‘yorker’ would be neither more nor less than a ‘full-pitch.’ However, as every batsman, we are thankful to say, is liable to err in judging the pitch, and as nearly every batsman when first going in is more liable to err with a ‘yorker’ than any other ball, the bowler should most decidedly try it. A slow bowler should first try a medium-paced ‘yorker,’ somewhat faster than his usual pace, and then a slower one. It is astonishing how many wickets fall to slow ‘yorkers;’ the ball is mistaken for everything but what it really is, viz. a full-pitch--for every ball pitching inside the crease must be playable as a full-pitch.

When a bowler is put on to bowl by his captain, it is his duty to do everything in his power to dislodge the batsman. It is really quite a secondary consideration for him whether many or few runs are being made off his bowling. It is the duty of the captain to tell the bowler when he wants the pace in the run-getting to be diminished, and then, and not till then, must the bowler begin to bowl straight and short with that object. But until certain instructions are given, the bowler must never stop for an instant in his endeavour to get the batsman’s wicket. If he has experimented with every one of his arts and is unsuccessful, or even if he becomes too expensive in run-getting before he has done this, the captain’s duty is to take him off.

It is a common sight enough to see a bowler put on in a match who simply dare not try the experiments which he has practised with success, for fear of being hit for a four or two and taken off. He is quite content to see ball after ball played full in the middle of the bat straight back to him, knowing well that with such bowling he has not the remotest chance of getting a wicket. In the hopes of getting a wicket a slow bowler should often try leg half-volleys; they are, of course, delightful balls for a batsman to hit, but, at the present day, when the old George Parr leg hit is comparatively unknown--viz. to fine long-leg all along the ground well behind the wicket--and the leg hitting off slows is generally high and square, they often result in a long-leg catch, and sometimes one at the wicket, through the batsman hitting too quick at the ball. A bowler who has been sending down ball after ball with the off break on should often try pitching one on the same spot but without the break; the batsman is very apt to play inside this ball, and place it in short-slip’s hands. In addition to the change of pace which we have above commented on, it is a most excellent thing occasionally to lower and heighten the action. Alfred Shaw used continually, by lowering his action, to send in a ball which skimmed, so to speak, from the pitch at a great pace, and much faster than his ordinary balls. The raising of the arm higher than usual makes the ball bound higher, which is very often an advantage, especially on rough cut-up grounds. The good-length ball outside the off stump, pitched perhaps eight inches to a foot wide of it, and without any break on at all, is often a most telling ball, especially to eager, excitable batsmen. The ball, not being straight, cannot be met with the full face of the bat, and consequently, unless the batsman puts his left leg right across the wicket, he must, in playing it, lift it up in the air, when it is probably captured by cover-point or mid-off. If this ball can be made to go ever so little from the leg side after it has pitched it becomes more deadly, as then there is a much greater chance of the batsman being unable to get over the ball sufficiently to keep it along the ground.

There has grown up in late years a most deplorable practice amongst batsmen of leaving balls on the off side alone, for fear of risking their wickets. In every match, big and little, one may see batsmen jump in front of their wickets time after time to off balls, allowing the ball to go by unplayed at, or if it twists to hit their legs. We call this a most deplorable practice, because it is not real cricket. The true object of the batsman is to defend his wicket with his bat; let him use his legs as well if he likes, but his bat he should certainly use, and when he holds the bat high in the air and guards his wicket with his legs, and legs alone, in our opinion he goes beyond the limit of legitimate batting. A batsman is perfectly right in refusing to hit or play at wide balls on the off side, but when he remains passive to balls a few inches only outside the off stump, he not only acknowledges his want of confidence in himself, but also degrades the dignity of a cricket bat by substituting in its place his own usually nervous legs. We remember seeing, some years back, a batsman who had completed his hundred refusing, on a perfectly good wicket, to play ball after ball on the off side. The famous old bowler David Buchanan was bowling at one end, and could not understand how some of his most lovely half-volleys were allowed to pass by unlooked at and despised. The batsman, however, was thoroughly well roasted by his own side and the other for his tame play; and it was satisfactory afterwards to learn that he had given up his weakness for seeing long-hops and half-volleys pass on the off without being first heavily taxed for the good of his side. It is rather a difficult thing for a slow bowler to know what to do when he has to bowl to a batsman of this sort. He might, of course, go on bowling on the off side, and try to tire the batsman out and make him play; but this, in these present days of good wickets and lengthy matches, would take far too long. The best course for a bowler to take is continually to alter his pace, and endeavour by pitching a ball sharper from the pitch and quicker than usual on the off stump to get the batsman out leg before wicket. Just the very slightest degree outside the off stump is also a good place for this class of player; he gets undecided whether to adopt his mawkish style of play or not, and in his indecision is apt to make mistakes.

A favourite scheme for a slow bowler to get rid of a batsman is by bowling him off his legs. This is always more easy of accomplishment when the batsman’s legs stand some distance from the leg-stump and his bat. When this is going to be tried an extra man should be put out on the on side between long-leg and deep field-on, as the ball which is to be bowled will, if hit by the batsman, generally go in that direction. If the bowler can dispense with a long-leg, it is advantageous to have a short-leg, perhaps a yard or two in front of the umpire, and also a mid-wicket on as near to the batsman as he can with safety venture. The ball should then be bowled with as much off break and as good a length as possible, in a line with the leg-stump; if played at and missed on account of the twist it hits the legs, and so cannons into the wicket. If it is met with the bat there is always a chance of the twist taking it into the hands of short-leg or mid-on. The place on which the ball pitches must depend on the state of the ground and the amount of twist that can be put on to the ball.

Spofforth, the Australian, was a bowler who used this ball very successfully, as indeed he did most others. When he had the ground in a suitable state--i.e. when it was sticky or else crumbled and loose--he used to place a short-leg close in to the batsman about two yards behind the wicket; he would also have another short-leg or mid-on close in to the batsman and fairly straight. He would then bowl about medium pace, pitching ball after ball a good length on the leg-stump, and with as much off break as he could get on, which, of course, would vary with the state of the ground. The result of this manœuvre was to make the batsman’s chance of remaining at the wickets for long extremely doubtful. The pace (medium) would compel him to play forward to all good-length balls; the break-back and abrupt rise or kick then made it very probable that he would either place the ball in the hands of one of the expectant short-legs or else be bowled off his bat or legs. The author recollects on one occasion having to play against the redoubtable Spofforth under the above circumstances. After receiving a few balls he came to the conclusion that it was absolutely impossible to prevent being captured by one of the short-legs, who were both standing ridiculously close, and every ball was rising uncomfortably high. He determined to take the liberty of pulling, and did so once or twice with success, till he paid the usual penalty of the practice on a kicking wicket by being badly cut over. He then tried jumping in front of his wicket and trying to slide the breaking balls off his bat to very fine long-leg. Spofforth, however, was too much for him, and almost immediately bowled a straight middle stump ball without any break on it and rather faster than the others; it kept low, hit the shin, and there was as dead a case of ‘l.b.w.’ as any bowler could wish for.

A favourite trick of some slow bowlers is to bowl from different distances. Sometimes the bowler will have one leg behind the wickets and the other in front, and sometimes both behind; we have even seen some bowl occasionally with the front leg as much as two yards behind the wicket. The object of this is to deceive the batsman as to the pitch of the ball by changing the distance the ball has to travel. This is doubtless an excellent theory, but in our opinion it is not of much worth in actual practice. We have seen bowlers of all sorts repeatedly try this experiment, but in our experience it never meets with any appreciable success. This is perhaps owing to the fact that the batsman can always see very clearly when the bowler does not come up the whole way to the wicket, and is accordingly on the alert for a shorter pitched ball than usual. The only practiser of this trick who ever seems to turn it to good account is Tom Emmett, the left-handed Yorkshire veteran; he usually bowls his slow wides from some distance behind the crease, and certainly obtains a fair share of wickets with these balls; but even in his case we think that it is generally not so much the difference in the distance that the ball has to travel which causes disaster to the batsman, as the latter’s anxiety and impatience to score from slow wide off balls, which look so easy and are really so deadly. However, though our opinion of this bowler’s ‘dodge’ is not particularly high, we still think it is worthy of trial at times by every slow bowler. A slow bowler should try every wile that can possibly be attempted; by adopting slow bowling he has undertaken to use the ‘wisdom of the serpent’ in the guise of the ‘harmlessness of the dove,’ and has sacrificed pace to cunning and thought. No slow bowler is worth his salt who merely tosses the ball into the air and trusts to chance for success, even if it has a little spin on it; he must continually think and diagnose every particular case which comes before him, and then adopt the measures necessary for each one. With this object it is the duty of every slow bowler to take advantage of any local peculiarity which the size and situation of the ground may afford. He should almost always have the choice of ends, except on occasions when the captain of the side considers that for some reason his fast bowler is more likely to get rid of the batting side for a small score than the slow, and then, of course, the fast must have the choice.

For example, in the University matches from 1878 to 1881, Oxford was so overmatched by Cambridge that in each of these years before the play began it was considered by the outside public as a foregone conclusion for the latter. The really knowing ones, however, who thoroughly understood the game, were aware that there was one man on the Oxford side who might any day get rid of the best side in England for a very small score. That man was Mr. Evans, the famous fast bowler. He was the only man on the side who, humanly speaking, seemed capable of turning the chances of the game. He consequently chose his own particular end--the one he thought most suited to his style, quite irrespective of any mediocre slow bowler that was on his side; and the havoc he played amongst the Cambridge wickets for those four years may be seen from the old scores. It is, however, an exception when a side depends almost entirely on its fast bowling, and it is only when this exception arises that a slow bowler (assuming him to be one who is competent to judge) must not have his choice of ends. Of course we mean his choice of ends at the commencement of an innings, as after that it is the captain’s duty to put any bowler on at either end, and it is the duty of every bowler to obey his captain cheerfully.

As already remarked, every slow bowler should take advantage of every local peculiarity that may offer itself. For instance, there may be a ground where a high tree is behind one of the wickets; the slow bowler, if he thinks this tree will help him at all, should take his measures accordingly. We hope none will think we are advocating anything at all unfair in the game, or anything that is even on the line between fairness and ‘not quite straight.’ As a rifle-shooter takes advantage of a lull in the wind to pull his trigger, as a deerstalker of every rock and unevenness of ground to approach his game--in short, just as in every kind of sport natural facilities may be utilised--so in bowling every peculiarity of time and place should be enlisted on the side of the bowler in his (in these days of good wickets and good batting) by no means easy task of getting rid of the batsman. If a bowler, who, we will say, usually bowls over the wicket, perceive that by bowling round the wicket he may make his bowling more difficult to see, and consequently more effective, on account of a tree, house, or hedge that is directly behind that side of the wicket, he should most certainly change and make the most of that advantage. An injudicious and talkative batsman often materially assists a bowler by such remarks as, ‘I can’t see your bowling a little bit. When tossed high in the air that beastly tree is right behind;’ or, ‘When you bowl over the wicket the ball gets right in a line with the dark windows of the pavilion, and I can’t see it at all.’ Can anyone imagine for a moment that a bowler will not do his very best instantly to make the most of the dark branches of the tree or the windows of the pavilion? The sun, too, often materially assists a slow bowler, especially during the last hour or hour and a half of the day’s play. If there are any trees round the ground, the shadows, beginning to lengthen, will often lie right across the pitch, and if there is one anywhere near where a good-length ball should pitch, it is advisable to try pitching one occasionally on it. If the sun is behind the bowler’s wicket and getting a little low, the bowler should try by bowling high slow ones to get it in the line of the batsman’s vision. Every possible advantage within the limits and spirit of fair play may be considered legitimate for a bowler. Local advantages of ground and weather are certainly within these limits, but any peculiarity of dress or tricks of manner, which are in themselves calculated to baulk or annoy a batsman, are not.

For example, bowling with a long loose and flapping sleeve in order to distract the batsman’s attention from the ball, a habit which of late has been seen on our English grounds, is in itself intrinsically unfair and unworthy of any true cricketer. And again, waving the arms behind the ball after it has been delivered, or any other trick adopted in order to worry or harass the batsman, is manifestly unfair. Some batsmen are extremely fastidious, and are distracted by the merest trifle. The writer remembers on one occasion taking part in a match when a batsman objected to a bowler on the ground that he was wearing a stud made of some bright material or stone, which glistened so in the sun that it diverted his attention from the ball. This, of course, sounded absurd, but the bowler at once removed the glittering nuisance, and rightly too.

A slow bowler must bear in mind what has before been mentioned, viz. that it is often almost as good as a change of bowling to change from over to round the wicket, or _vice versâ_, quite apart from the advantage he may gain from any local obstruction to good light. Supposing a slow bowler has been ‘on’ for some time over the wicket, as a rule the great majority of his balls have been pitched a few inches outside the off stump and breaking in to the middle or middle and leg. The batsman has got thoroughly into the way of playing this particular ball, and does not show any signs of making a mistake. The bowler goes round the wicket, and although he still continues to pitch a little outside the off stump, the ball is quite different now from what it was from over the wicket. It is, of course, impossible to get as much ‘break-back’ spin on to the ball when bowling round as over the wicket, because the ball is delivered several feet from a straight line between the two wickets, but in most conditions of the ground it is possible to get a certain amount on. The change in the direction of the ball, or rather in the spot from which it is delivered, combined with the diminution in the amount of break, makes it often a most effective change and one well worth the trial. In addition there is always from round the wicket the chance of a batsman playing inside a ball which, delivered without any spin at all, keeps going across the wicket, as it is technically called, ‘with the arm.’

We cannot omit, when enumerating the different balls of which a slow bowler may avail himself, one which is by no means used as often as it should be, viz. the full-pitch. In slow bowling there are three different kinds of full-pitches--the high-dropping full-pitch, which will pitch either on the top of the wicket or a few inches before it; the ordinary slow full-pitch, which reaches the batsman about the height of his knees; and the medium-paced full-pitch, which will hit the stumps nearly at the top. The high-dropping full-pitch is a ball that is seldom used, the reason for its rarity probably being the extreme difficulty of bowling it accurately and the certain punishment it will meet with if it falls at all short either in height or length of what it should be. It should be delivered as high as possible; there is no limit to the height this ball may go in the air, as the higher it ascends the more difficult it is to play. It should be bowled so that it reaches its highest point when it is almost directly over the head of the batsman, and should pitch on the very top of the stumps. It is strange that this ball is not more often practised by slow bowlers, as, especially to the pokey, nervous style of batsmen, it is fraught with considerable uneasiness and requires some skill to play properly. To really first-class punishing batsmen it is a ball which has comparatively no terrors, and on which not much reliance can be placed, though it should always, in our opinion, be tried at least once to every batsman who is getting ‘well set.’ But to the poker, the man who refuses to do anything but stick his bat in front of the wicket, who lets half-volleys, full-pitches, and long-hops pass unscathed and unplayed on both sides of him--to him who considers he is doing his side good service by wasting three hours of valuable time for a dozen runs on his side of the balance, and three hours’ wear and tear of the wicket on the other--to him who helps so greatly to fill up the records of drawn matches, the high-dropping full-pitch is an excellent ball. He does not know what to do with it; he is afraid to step back to play it for fear of hitting his wicket, and he hardly likes to be so bold as to try to cut or hit it on the on side. One of the most amusing sights we have ever seen at cricket was one of these batsmen having ball after ball of this sort bowled to him; it was not till after he had nearly lost his wicket a dozen times, only keeping it by exceptional good luck, and had afforded the greatest merriment to players and spectators alike, that he burst out from sheer desperation into wild and furious hitting--a line of conduct which had the immediate effect of compelling the bowler to desist from his lofty attacks.

The second kind of full-pitch--the one reaching the batsman about the height of his knees--is the most usual of full-pitches, and enjoys the distinction of being considered the easiest of all balls to hit. A good batsman can hit this ball from a slow bowler to almost any part of the field; consequently, though it often happens in the chapter of accidents that a wicket falls to this ball--a catch in the country perhaps, or a hard catch and bowl--it is of all balls the very worst for a slow bowler to deliver, except perhaps a long hop.

The third kind--the medium-paced full-pitch straight to the top of the stumps--is occasionally, for a slow bowler, a very useful ball. In the first place, it is not quite so easy to hit as it appears to the batsman; the change in pace from slow to medium often causes him to hit a trifle slower than he should do, when the ball, coming on faster than expected, hits the top or splice of the bat, and goes straight up in the air. This ball is generally more successful with players who have a partiality for on-side hitting than with others, as it is never a difficult one to play quietly; it is only when the batsman tries to hit that it becomes likely to get a wicket. It is also useful when a hitter, by running out and hitting every ball, is demoralising bowler, fielders, and the whole side. If the bowler sees the intention of the hitter to run out before the ball is delivered--and he is often able to do this--he can do nothing better than bowl a good medium-paced full-pitch straight at the top of the middle stump; if the batsman goes on with his intention of running out, he is not only apt to overrun this faster than usual ball, and let it pass over the top of his bat, but if he does hit it he is likely to send it high in the air, from the above-mentioned cause of catching it with the top or splice of the bat. There is, however, nothing so flurrying to a bowler as a batsman who runs out to every ball, and who evinces his intention of doing so before the ball is delivered. The writer has often talked with old cricketers on this subject, and they have remarked how well the old bowlers of their early days used to keep their heads under these trying circumstances. Doubtless they deserve the very greatest credit for doing so, for there is nothing so trying to a bowler; it spoils his pitch, and is rather apt to do the same to his temper. The regular attendant at matches may have seen almost every bowler of reputation in England so thoroughly flurried and upset by a batsman doing this, that, in spite of all efforts to keep cool, the bowling was simply paralysed and rendered useless to the side for the time being. The best courses for a slow bowler to pursue on these occasions is, 1st, to bowl the sort of full-pitch just discussed; and, 2nd, to increase his pace a little, and bowl a little short of a good length, about a foot or more outside the legs of the batsman. There is nothing a rushing-out batsman finds so hard to hit as a ball well outside his legs.

Widish off balls are also useful, as a batsman going down the wicket is not only apt to miss, but also, if he can reach, to sky them. A high full-pitch into the hands of the wicket-keeper is likewise sometimes successful; but, though we may lay down certain rules and suggestions as to what is best for a bowler to do at this very trying time, we are afraid that, unless he is able to keep exceptionally cool, they will be of no practical assistance.