Βαττολογια, OR THE SCIENCE AND ART OF BATTING.
A writer in “Blackwood” once attributed the success of his magazine to
the careful exclusion of every bit of science, or reasoning, above half
an inch long. The Cambridge Professors do not exclusively represent the
mind of Parker’s Piece; so, away with the stiffness of analysis and the
mysteries of science: the laws of dynamics might puzzle, and the very
name of _physics_ alarm, many an able-bodied cricketer; so, invoking
the genius of our mother tongue, let us exhibit science in its more
palatable form.
All the balls that can be bowled may, for all practical purposes, be
reduced to a few simple classes, and plain rules given for all and
each. There are what are called good balls, and bad balls. The former,
good lengths, and straight, while puzzling to the eye; the latter, bad
lengths and wide, while easy to see and to hit.
But, is not a good hand and eye quite enough, with a little practice,
without all this theory? Do you ignore the Pilches and the Parrs, who
have proved famous hitters from their own sense alone?--The question
is, not how many have succeeded, but how many more have failed. Cricket
by nature is like learning from a village dame; it leaves a great deal
to be untaught before the pupil makes a good scholar. If you have
Caldecourt’s, Wisden’s, or Lillywhite’s instructions, _vivâ voce_, why
not on paper also? What, though many excellent musicians do not know
a note, every good musician will bear witness that the consequence of
Nature’s teaching is, that men form a vicious habit almost impossible
to correct, a lasting bar to brilliant execution. And why?--because
the piano or the violin leaves no dexterity or rapidity to spare. The
muscles act freely in one way only, in every other way with loss of
power. So with batting. A good ball requires all the power and energy
of the man! And, as with riding, driving, rowing, or every other
exercise, it depends on a certain form, attitude, or position, whether
this power be forthcoming or not.
The scope for useful instructions for _forming good habits of hitting
before their place is preoccupied with bad_--for, “there’s the rub”--is
very great indeed. If Pilch, and Clarke, and Lillywhite, averaging
fifty years each, are still indifferent to pace in bowling,--and if
Mr. Ward, as late as 1844, scored forty against Mr. Kirwan’s swiftest
bowling, while some of the most active young men, of long experience in
cricket, are wholly unequal to the task; then, it is undeniable that a
batsman may form a certain invaluable habit, which youth and strength
cannot always give, nor age and inactivity entirely take away.
The following are simple rules for forming correct habits of play; for
adding the judgment of the veteran to the activity of youth, or putting
an old head on young shoulders, and teaching the said young shoulders
not to get into each other’s way.
All balls that can be bowled are reducible to “length balls” and “not
lengths.”
_Not lengths_, are the toss, the tice, the half volley, the long hop,
and ground balls.
These are _not length balls_, not pitched at that critical length
which puzzles the judgment as to whether to play forward or back, as
will presently be explained. These are all “bad balls;” and among good
players considered certain hits; though, from the delusive confidence
they inspire, sometimes they are bowled with success against even the
best of players.
These _not lengths_, therefore, being the easiest to play, as requiring
only hand and eye, but little judgment, are the best for a beginner to
practise; so, we will set the tyro in a proper position to play them
with certainty and effect.
POSITION.--Look at any professional player,--observe how he stands
and holds his bat. Much, very much, depends on position,--so look
at the figure of Pilch. This is substantially the attitude of every
good batsman. Some think he should bend the right knee a little; but
an anatomist reminds me that it is when the limb is straight that
the muscles are relaxed, and most ready for sudden action. Various
as attitudes appear to the casual observer, all coincide in the main
points marked in the figure of Pilch in our frontispiece. For, all good
players,--
1st. Stand with the right foot just within the line. Further in, would
limit the reach and endanger the wicket: further out, would endanger
stumping.
2dly. All divide their weight between their two feet, though making the
right leg more the pillar and support, the left being rather lightly
placed, and more ready to move on, off, or forward, and this we will
call the Balance-foot.
3rdly. All stand as close as they can without being before the wicket;
otherwise, the bat cannot be upright, nor can the eye command a line
from the bowler’s hand.
4thly. All stand at guard as upright as is easy to them. We say _easy_,
not to forbid a slight stoop,--the attitude of extreme caution. Height
is a great advantage, “and a big man,” says Dakin, “is foolish to make
himself into a little man.” If the eye is low, you cannot have the
commanding sight, nor, as players say, “see as much of the game,” as if
you hold up your head, and look well at the bowler.
5thly. All stand easy, and hold the bat lightly, yet firmly, in their
hands. However rigid your muscles, you must relax them, as already
observed, before you can start into action. Rossi, the sculptor, made a
beautiful marble statue of a batsman at guard, for the late Mr. William
Ward, who said, “You are no cricketer, Mr. Sculptor; the wrists are too
rigid, and hands too much clenched.”
After standing at guard in the attitude of Pilch, _fig. 1._ shows the
bat taken up ready for action. But, at what moment are you to raise
your bat? Caldecourt teaches, and some very good players observe, the
habit of not raising the bat till they have seen the pitch of the
ball. This is said to tend both to safety and system in play; but a
first-rate player, who has already attained to a right system, should
aspire to more power and freedom, and rise into the attitude of _fig.
1._ as soon as the ball is out of the bowler’s hand. Good players
often begin an innings with their bat down, and raise it as they gain
confidence.
[Illustration: _Fig. 1._
Preparing for Action. The toes are too much before Wicket, and foot
hardly within the crease. Foreshortening suits our illustration better
than artistic effect.]
_Meet the ball with as full a bat as the case admits._ Consider the
full force of this rule.
1st. _Meet the ball._ The bat must strike the ball, not the ball the
bat. Even if you block, you can block hard, and the wrists may do a
little; so, with a good player this rule admits of no exception. Young
players must not think I recommend a flourish, but an exact movement of
the bat at the latest possible instant. In playing back to a bail ball,
a good player meets the ball, and plays it with a resolute movement of
arm and wrist. Pilch is not caught in the attitude of what some call
Hanging guard, letting the ball hit his bat dead, once in a season.
2dly. _With a full bat._ A good player has never less wood than 21
inches by 4¼ inches before his wicket as he plays the ball, a bad
player has rarely more than a bat’s width alone. Remember the old
rule, to keep the left shoulder over the ball, and left elbow well up.
Good players must avoid doing this in excess; for, some play from leg
to off, across the line of the ball, in their over care to keep the
shoulder over it. Fix a bat by pegs in the ground, and try to bowl
the wicket down, and you will perceive what an unpromising antagonist
this simple rule creates. I like to see a bat, as the ball is coming,
hang perpendicular as a pendulum from the player’s wrists. The best
compliment ever paid me was this:--“Whether you play forward or back,
hitting or stopping, the wicket is always covered to the full measure
of your bat.” So said a friend well known in North Devon, whose
effective bowling, combined with his name, has so often provoked the
pun of “the falls of the _Clyde_.”
3dly. _As full a bat as the case admits_: you cannot present a full bat
to any but a straight ball. A bat brought forward from the centre stump
to a ball Off or to leg, must be minutely oblique and form an angle
sufficient to make Off or On hits.
Herein then consists the great excellence of batting, _in presenting
the largest possible face of the bat to the ball_. While the bat is
descending on the ball, the ball may rise or turn, to say nothing of
the liability of the hand to miss, and then the good player has always
half the width of his bat, besides its height, to cover the deviation;
whereas, the cross player is far more likely to miss, from the least
inaccuracy of hand and eye, or twist of the ball.
And, would you bring a full bat even to a toss? Would you not cut it to
the Off or hit across to the On?
This question tries my rule very hard certainly; but though nothing
less than a hit from a toss can satisfy a good player, still I have
seen the most brilliant hitters, when a little out of practice, lose
their wicket, or hit a catch from the edge of the bat, by this common
custom of hitting across even to a toss or long hop.
To hit tosses is good practice, requiring good time and quick wrist
play. If you see a man play stiff, and “up in a heap,” a swift toss is
worth trying. Bowlers should practise both toss and tice.
We remember Wenman playing well against fine bowling; when an underhand
bowler was put on, who bowled him with a toss, fourth ball.
To play tosses, and ground balls, and hops, and every variety of
loose bowling, by the rigid rules of straight and upright play, is
a principle, the neglect of which has often given the old hands a
laugh at the young ones. Often have I been amused to see the wonder
and disappointment occasioned, when some noted member of a University
Eleven, or the Marylebone Club, from whom all expected of course the
most tremendous hitting “off mere underhand bowling,” has been easily
disposed of by a toss or a ground ball, yclept a “sneak.”
A fast ball to the middle stump, however badly bowled, no player can
afford to treat too easily. A ball that grounds more than once may
turn more than once; and, the bat though properly 4¼ inches wide, is
considerably reduced when used across wicket; so _never hit across
wicket_. To turn to loose bowling, and hit from leg stump square
to the on side with full swing of the body, is very gratifying and
very effective; and, perhaps you may hit over the tent, or, as I
once saw, into a neighbour’s carriage; but, while the natives are
marvel-stricken, Caldecourt will shake his head, and inwardly grieve at
folly so triumphant.
This reminds me of a memorable match in 1834, of Oxford against Cowley,
the village which fostered those useful members of university society;
who, during the summer term, bowl at sixpences on stumps sometimes
eight hours a day, and have strength enough left at the end to win one
sixpence more.
The Oxonians, knowing the ground or knowing their bowlers, scored above
200 runs in their first innings. Then Cowley grew wiser; and even now
a Cowley man will tell the tale, how they put on one Tailor Humphreys
to bowl twisting underhand sneaks, at which the Oxonians laughed, and
called it “no cricket;” but it actually levelled their wickets for
fewer runs than were made against Bayley and Cobbett the following
week. The Oxonians, too eager to score, and thinking it so easy, hit
across and did not play their usual game.
Never laugh at bowling that takes wickets. Bowling that is bad, often
for that very reason meets with batting that is worse. Nothing shows
a thorough player more than playing with caution even badly pitched
underhand bowling.
One of the best judges of the game I ever knew was once offered by a
fine hitter a bet that he could not with his underhand bowling make
him “give a chance” in half an hour.
“Then you know nothing of the game,” was the reply; “I would bowl you
nothing but Off tosses, which you must cut; you would not cut those
correctly for half an hour, for you could not use a straight bat once.
Your bet ought to be,--no chance before so many runs.”
Peter Heward, an excellent wicket-keeper of Leicester,--of the same
day as Henry Davis, one of the finest and most graceful hitters ever
seen, as Dakin, or any midland player will attest,--once observed to
me, “Players are apt to forget that a bad bowler may bowl one or two
balls as well as the best; so, to make a good average, you must always
play the same guarded and steady game, and take care especially when
late in the season.” “Why late in the season?” “Because the ground is
damp and heavy--it takes the spring out of good bowling, and gives fast
underhand bowling as many twists as it has hops, besides making it hang
on the ground. This game is hardly worth playing it is true; but a man
is but half a player who is only prepared for true ground.” “We do not
play cricket,” he continued, “on billiard tables; wind and weather,
and the state of the turf make all the difference. So, if you play to
win, play the game that will carry you through; and that is a straight
and upright game; use your eyes well; play not at the pitch, nor by the
length, but always (what few men do) at the ball itself, and never hit
or ‘pull the ball’ across wicket.”
Next as to the _half-volley_. This is the most delightful of all
balls to hit, because it takes the right part of the bat, with all
the quickness of its rise or rebound. Any player will show you what a
half-volley is, and I presume that every reader has some living lexicon
to explain common terms. A half-volley, then, is very generally hit
in the air, soaring far above every fieldsman’s head; and to know the
power of the bat, every hitter should learn so to hit at pleasure.
Though, as a rule, _high hits make a low average_. But I am now to
speak only of hitting half-volleys along the ground.
Every time you play forcibly at the pitch of a ball you have more or
less of the half-volley; so this is a material point in batting. The
whole secret consists partly in timing your hit well, and partly in
taking the ball at the right part of the rise, so as to play the ball
down without wasting its force against the ground.
Every player thinks he can hit a half-volley along the ground; but
if once you see it done by a really brilliant hitter, you will soon
understand that such hitting admits of many degrees of perfection. In
forward play, or driving, fine hitters seem as if they felt the ball
on the bat, and sprung it away with an elastic impulse; and, in the
more forcible hits, a ball from one of the All England batsmen appears
not so much like a hit as a shot from the bat: for, when a ball is hit
in the swiftest part of the bat’s whirl, and with that part of the bat
that gives the greatest force with the least jar, the ball appears to
offer no resistance; its momentum is annihilated by the whirl of the
bat, and the two-and-twenty fieldsmen find to their surprise how little
ground a fieldsman can cover against true and accurate hitting.
Clean hitting requires a loose arm, the bat held firmly, but not
clutched in the hand till the moment of hitting; clumsy gloves are a
sad hindrance, the hit is not half so crisp and smart. The bat must be
brought forward not only by the free swing of the arm working well from
the shoulder, but also by the wrist. (Refer to _fig. 1._ p. 115.) Here
is the bat ready thrown back, and wrists proportionally bent; from that
position a hit is always assisted by wrist as well as arm. The effect
of the wrist alone, slight as its power appears, is very material in
hitting; this probably arises from the greater precision and better
time in which a wrist hit is commonly made.
As to hard hitting, if two men have equal skill, the stronger man
will send the ball farthest. Many slight men drive a ball nearly as
far as larger men, because they exert their force in a more skilful
manner. We have seen a man six feet three inches in height, and of
power in proportion, hit a ball tossed to him--not once or twice, but
repeatedly--a hundred yards or more in the air. This, perhaps, is more
than any light man could do. But, the best man at putting the stone and
throwing a weight we ever saw, was a man of little more than ten stone.
In this exercise, as in wrestling, the application of a man’s whole
weight at the proper moment is the chief point: so also in hard hitting.
The whirl of the bat may be accelerated by wrist, fore-arm, and
shoulder: let each joint bear its proper part.
NUTS FOR STRONG TEETH.--All effective hits must be made with both hands
and arms; and, in order that both arms may apply their force, the point
at which the ball is struck should be opposite the middle of the body.
Take a bat in your hand, poise the body as for a half-volley hit
forward, the line from shoulder to shoulder being parallel with the
line of the ball. Now whirl the bat in the line of the ball, and
you will find that it reaches that part of its circle where it is
perpendicular to the ground,--midway between the shoulders; at that
moment the bat attains its greatest velocity; so, then alone can the
strongest hit be made. Moreover, a hit made at this moment will drive
the ball parallel to and skimming the ground. And if, in such a hit,
the lower six inches of the bat’s face strike the ball, the hit is
properly called a “clean hit,” being free from all imperfections. The
same may be said of a horizontal hit, or cut. The bat should meet the
ball when opposite the body. I do not say that every hit should be made
in this manner; I only say that a perfect hit can be made in no other,
and that it should be the aim of the batsman to attain this position
of the body as often as he can. Nor is this mere speculation on the
scientific principle of batting; it arises from actual observation of
the movements of the best batsmen. All good hitters make their hits
just at the moment when the ball is opposite the middle of their body.
Watch any fine Off-hitter. If he hits to Mid-wicket, his breast is
turned to Mid-wicket; if he hits, I mean designedly, to Point, his
breast is turned to Point. I do not say that his hits would always go
to those parts of the field; because the speed and spin of the ball
will always, to a greater or less degree, prevent its going in the
precise direction of the hit; but I only say that the ball is always
hit by the best batsmen when just opposite to them. Cutting forms no
exception: the best cutters turn the body round on the basis of the
feet till the breast fronts the ball,--having let the ball go almost
as far as the bails,--and then the full power of the hitter is brought
to bear with the least possible diminution of the original speed of
the ball. This is the meaning of the observation,--that fine cutters
appear to follow the ball, and at the latest moment cut the ball off
the bails; for, if you do not follow the ball, by turning your breast
to it at the moment you hit, you can have no power for a fine cut.
It makes good “Chamber practice” to suspend a ball oscillating by a
string: you will thus see wherein lies that peculiar power of cutting,
which characterises Mr. Bradshaw, Mr. Felix, and Mr. C. Taylor; as of
old, Searle, Saunders, and Robinson. Robinson cut so late that the ball
often appeared past the wicket.
And these hints will suffice to awaken attention to the powers of the
bat. Clean hitting is a thing to be carefully studied; the player who
has never discovered his deficiency in it, had better examine and see
whether there is not a secret he has yet to learn.
_The Tice._ Safest to block: apt to be missed, because a dropping ball;
hard to get away, because on the ground. Drop the bat smartly on the
ground, and it will make a run, but do not try too much of a hit. The
Tice is almost a full pitch; the way to hit it, says Caldecourt, is to
go in and make it a full pitch: I cannot advise this for beginners.
Going in even to a Tice puts you out of form for the next ball, and
creates a dangerous habit.
_Ground balls_, and all balls that touch the ground more than once
between wickets, I have already hinted, are reckoned very easy,
but they are always liable to prove very dangerous. Sometimes you
have three hops, and the last like a good length ball: at each hop
the ball may twist On or Off with the inequalities of the ground;
also, if bowled with the least bias, there is much scope for that
bias to produce effect. All these peculiarities account for a fact,
strange but true, that the best batsmen are often out with the worst
bowling. Bad bowling requires a game of its own, and a game of the
greatest care, where too commonly we find the least; because “only
underhand bowling,”--and “not by any means good lengths;” it requires,
especially, playing at the ball itself, even to the last inch, and not
by calculation of the pitch or rise.
Let me further remark that hitting, to be either free, quick, or clean,
must be done by the arms and wrists, and not by the body; though the
weight of the body appears to be thrown in by putting down the left
leg; though, in reality, the leg comes down after the hit to restore
the balance.
Can a man throw his body into a blow (at cricket)? About as much as he
can hold up a horse with a bridle while sitting on the same horse’s
back. Both are common expressions; both are at variance with the laws
of nature. A man can only hit by whirling his bat in a circle. If
he stands with both feet near together, he hits feebly because in a
smaller circle; if he throws his left foot forward, he hits harder
because in a wider circle. A pugilist cannot throw in his body with a
round hit; and a cricketer cannot make anything else but round hits.
Take it as a rule in hitting, that what is not elegant is not right;
for the human frame is rarely inelegant in its movements when all
the muscles act in their natural direction. Many men play with their
shoulders up to their ears, and their sinews all in knots, and because
they are conscious of desperate exertion, they forget that their force
is going anywhere rather than into the ball. It is often remarked that
hard hitting does not depend on strength. No. It depends not on the
strength a man has, but on the strength he exerts, at the right time
and in the right direction; and strength is exerted in hitting, as in
throwing a ball, in exact proportion to the rapidity of the whirl or
circle which the bat or hand describes. The point of the bat moves
faster in the circle than any other part; and, therefore, did not the
jar, resulting from the want of resistance, place the point of hitting,
as experience shows, a little higher up, the nearer the end the harder
would be the hit. The wrist, however slight its force, acting with a
multiplying power, adds greatly to the speed of this whirl.
Hard hitting, then, depends, first, on the freedom with which the
arm revolves from the shoulder, unimpeded by constrained efforts and
contortions of the body; next, on the play of the arm at the elbow;
thirdly, on the wrists. Observe any cramped clumsy hitter, and you will
recognise these truths at once. His elbow seems glued to his side, his
shoulder stiff at the joint, and the little speed of his bat depends on
a twist and a wriggle of his whole body.
Keep your body as composed and easy as the requisite adjustment of the
left leg will admit; let your arms do the hitting; and remember the
wrists. The whiz that meets the ear will be a criterion of increasing
power. Practise hard hitting,--that is, the full and timely application
of your strength, not only for the value of the extra score, but
because hard hitting and correct and clean hitting are one and the same
thing. Mere stopping balls and poking about in the blockhole is not
cricket, however successful; and I must admit, that one of the most
awkward, poking, vexatious blockers that ever produced a counterfeit of
cricket, defied Bayley and Cobbett at Oxford in 1836,--three hours, and
made five and thirty runs. Another friend, a better player, addicted to
the same teasing game, in a match at Exeter in 1845, blocked away till
his party, the N. Devon, won the match, chiefly by byes and wide balls!
Such men might have turned their powers to much better account.
Some maintain that anything that succeeds is cricket; but not such
cricket as full-grown men should vote a scientific and a manly
exercise; otherwise, to “run cunning” might be Coursing, and to kill
sitting Shooting. A player may happen to succeed with what is not
generally a successful style,--winning in spite of his awkwardness, and
not by virtue of it.
But there is another cogent reason for letting your arms, and not your
body, do the work,--namely, that it makes all the difference to your
sight whether the level of the eye remains the same as with a composed
and easy hitter; or, unsteady and changing, as with the wriggling and
the clumsy player. Whether a ball undulates in the air, or whether
there is an equal undulation in the line of the eye which regards that
ball, the confusion and indistinctness is the same. As an experiment,
look at any distant object, and move your head up and down, and you
will understand the confusion of sight to which I allude. The only
security of a good batsman, as of a good shot, consists in the hand and
eye being habituated to act together. Now, the hand may obey the eye
when at rest, but have no such habit when in unsteady motion. And this
shows how uncertain all hitting must be, when, either by the movement
of the body or other cause, the line of sight is suddenly raised or
depressed.
The same law of sight shows the disadvantage of men who stand at guard
very low, and then suddenly raise themselves as the ball is coming.
The same law of sight explains the disadvantage of stepping in to hit,
especially with a slow dropping ball: the eye is puzzled by a double
motion--the change in the level of the ball, and the change in the
level of the line of sight.
So much for our theory; now for experience! Look at Pilch and all fine
players. How characteristic is the ease and repose of their figures--no
hurry or trepidation. How little do their heads or bodies move! Bad
players dance about, as if they stood on hot iron, a dozen times while
the ball is coming, with precisely the disadvantage that attends an
unsteady telescope. “Then you would actually teach a man how to see?”
We would teach him how to give his eyes a fair chance. Of sight, as of
quickness, most players have enough, if they would only make good use
of it.
To see a man wink his eyes and turn his head away is not uncommon the
first day of partridge shooting, and quite as common at the wicket.
An undoubting judgment and knowledge of the principles of batting
literally improves the sight, for it increases that calm confidence
which is essential for keeping your eyes open and in a line to see
clearly.
Sight of a ball also depends on a habit of undivided attention both
before and after delivery, and very much on health. A yellow bilious
eye bespeaks a short innings: so, be very careful what you eat and
drink when engaged to play a match. At a match at Purton in 1836, five
of the Lansdowne side, after supping on crab and champagne, could do
nothing but lie on the grass. But your sight may be seriously affected
when you do not feel actually ill. So Horace found at Capua:--
“_Namque pilâ lippis inimicum et ludere crudis._”
STRAIGHT AND UPRIGHT PLAY.--To be a good judge of a horse, to have
good common sense, and to hit straight and upright at Cricket, are
qualifications never questioned without dire offence. Yet few, very
few, ever play as upright as they might play, and that even to guard
their three stumps. To be able, with a full and upright bat, to play
well over and to command a ball a few inches to the Off, or a little to
the leg, is a very superior and rare order of ability.
The first exercise for learning upright play is to practise several
times against an easy bowler, with both hands on the same side of the
handle of the bat. Not that this is the way to hold a bat in play,
though the bat so held must be upright; but this exercise of rather
poking than playing will inure you to the habit and method of upright
play. Afterwards shift your hands to their proper position, and
practise slipping your left hand round into the same position, while in
the act of coming forward.
But be sure you stand up to your work, or close to your blockhole;
and let the bowler admonish you every time you shrink away or appear
afraid of the ball. Much practice is required before it is possible
for a young player to attain that perfect composure and indifference
to the ball that characterises the professor. The least nervousness
or shrinking is sure to draw the bat out of the perpendicular. As to
shrinking from the ball--I do not mean any apprehension of injury, but
only the result of a want of knowledge of length or distance, and the
result of uncertainty as to how the ball is coming, and how to prepare
to meet it. Nothing distinguishes the professor from the amateur more
than the composed and unshrinking posture in which he plays a ball.
Practice alone will prevent shrinking: so encourage your bowler
continually to remind you of it. As to practising with a bowler, you
see some men at Lord’s and the University grounds batting hour after
hour, as if cricket were to be taken by storm. To practise long at one
time is positively injurious. For about one hour a man may practise to
advantage; for a second hour, he may rather improve his batting even
by keeping wicket, or acting long stop. Anything is good practice for
batting which only habituates the hand and eye to act together.
The next exercise is of a more elegant kind, and quite coincident
with your proper game. Always throw back the point of the bat, while
receiving the ball, to the top of the middle stump, as in figure, page
114; then the handle will point to the bowler, and the whole bat be in
the line of the wicket. By commencing in this position, you cannot fail
to bring your bat straight and full upon the ball. If you take up your
bat straight, you cannot help hitting straight; but if once you raise
the point of the bat across the wicket, to present a full bat for that
ball is quite impossible.
One advantage of this exercise is that it may be practised even without
a bowler. The path of a field, with ball and bat, and a stick for a
stump, are all the appliances required. Place the ball before you,
one, two, or more feet in advance, and more or less On or Off, at
discretion. Practise hitting with right foot always fixed, and with as
upright and full a bat as possible: keep your left elbow up, and always
over the ball.
This exercise will teach, at the same time, the full powers of the bat;
what style of hitting is most efficacious; at what angle you smother
the ball, and at what you can hit clean; only, be careful to play in
form; and always see that your right foot has not moved before you
follow to pick up the ball. Fixing the right foot is alone a great help
to upright play; for while the right foot remains behind, you are so
completely over a straight ball, and in a form to present a full bat,
that you will rarely play across the ball. Firmness in the right foot
is also essential to hard hitting, for you cannot exert much strength
unless you stand in a firm and commanding position.
Upright and straight hitting, then, requires, briefly, the point of the
bat thrown back to the middle stump as the ball is coming; secondly,
the left elbow well up; and, thirdly, the right foot fixed, and near
the blockhole.
Never play a single ball without strict attention to these three
rules. At first you will feel cramped and powerless; but practice will
soon give ease and elegance, and form the habit not only of all sure
defence, but of all certain hitting: for, the straight player has
always wood enough and to spare in the way of the ball; whereas, a
deviation of half an inch leaves the cross-player at fault. Mr. William
Ward once played a single-wicket match with a thick stick, against
another with a bat; yet these are not much more than the odds of good
straight play against cross play. At Cheltenham College the first
Eleven plays the second Eleven “a broomstick match.”
When a player hits almost every time he raises his bat, the remark is,
What an excellent eye that batsman has! But, upright play tends far
more than eye to certainty in hitting. It is not easy to miss when you
make the most of every inch of your bat. But when you trust to the
width alone, a slight error produces a miss, and not uncommonly a catch.
The great difficulty in learning upright play consists in detecting
when you are playing across. So your practice-bowler must remind you
of the slightest shifting of the foot, shrinking from the wicket, or
declination of your bat. Straight bowling is more easy to stand up to
without nervous shrinking, and slow bowling best reveals every weak
point, because a slow ball must be played: it will not play itself.
Many stylish players are beaten by slow bowling; some, because never
thoroughly grounded in the principles of correct play and judgment of
lengths; others, because hitting by rule and not at the ball. System
with scientific players is apt to supersede sight; so take care as the
mind’s eye opens the natural eye does not shut.
Underhand bowling is by far the best for a learner, and learners are,
or should be, a large class. Being generally at the wicket, it produces
the straightest play: falling stumps are “no flatterers, but feelingly
remind us what we are.” Caldecourt, who had a plain, though judicious,
style of bowling, once observed a weak point in Mr. Ward’s play, and
levelled his stumps three times in about as many balls. Many men
boasting, as Mr. Ward then did, of nearly the first average of his day,
would have blamed the bowler, the ground, the wind, and, in short, any
thing but themselves; but Mr. Ward, a liberal patron of the game, in
the days of his prosperity, gave Caldecourt a guinea for his judgment
in the game and his useful lesson. “Such,” Dr. Johnson would say, “is
the spirit and self-denial of those whose memories are not doomed to
decay” with their bats, but play cricket for “immortality.”
PLAYING FORWARD AND BACK.--And now about length-balls, and when to play
forward at the pitch, and when back for a better sight of the rebound.
A length-ball is one that pitches at a puzzling length from the bat.
This length cannot be reduced to any exact and uniform measurement,
depending on the delivery of the bowler and the reach of the batsman.
For more intelligible explanation, I must refer you to your friends.
[Illustration]
Every player is conscious of one particular length that puzzles
him,--of one point between himself and the bowler, in which he would
rather that the ball should not pitch. “There is a length-ball that
almost blinds you,” said an experienced player at Lord’s. There is a
length that makes many a player shut his eyes and turn away his head;
“a length,” says Mr. Felix, “that brings over a man most indescribable
emotions.” There are two ways to play such balls: to discriminate is
difficult, and, “if you doubt, you are lost.” Let A be the farthest
point to which a good player can reach, so as to plant his bat at the
proper angle, at once preventing a catch, stopping a shooter, and
intercepting a bailer. Then, at any point short of A, should the bat
be placed, the ball may rise over the bat if held to the ground, or
shoot under if the bat is a little raised. At B the same single act of
planting the bat cannot both cover a bailer and stop a shooter. Every
ball which the batsman can reach, as at A, may be met with a full bat
forward; and, being taken at the pitch, it is either stopped or driven
away with all its rising, cutting, shooting, or twisting propensities
undeveloped. If not stopped at A, the ball may rise and shoot in six
lines at least; so, if forced to play back, you have six things to
guard against instead of one. Still, any ball you cannot cover forward,
as at B, must be played back; and nearly in the attitude shown in page
115. This back play gives as long a sight of the ball as possible, and
enables the player either to be up for a bailer or down for a shooter.
MORE HARD NUTS.--Why do certain lengths puzzle, and what is the nature
of all this puzzling emotion? It is a sense of confusion and of doubt.
At the moment of the pitch, the ball is lost in the ground; so you
doubt whether it will rise, or whether it will shoot--whether it will
twist, or come in straight. The eye follows the ball till it touches
the ground: till this moment there is no great doubt, for its course
is known to be uniform. I say no great doubt, because there is always
some doubt till the ball has passed some yards from the bowler’s hand.
The eye cannot distinguish the direction of a ball approaching till it
has seen a fair portion of its flight. Then only can you calculate what
the rest of the flight will be. Still, before the ball has pitched, the
first doubt is resolved, and the batsman knows the ball’s direction;
but, when once it touches the ground, the change of light alone (earth
instead of air being the background) is trying to the eye. Then, at
the rise, recommences all the uncertainty of a second delivery; for,
the direction of the ball has once more to be ascertained, and that
requires almost as much time for sight as will sometimes bring the ball
into the wicket.
All this difficulty of sight applies only to the batsman; to him the
ball is advancing and foreshortened in proportion as it is straight.
If the ball is rather wide, or if seen, as by Point, from the side,
the ball may be easily traced, without confusion, from first to last.
It is the fact of an object approaching perfectly straight to you,
that confuses your sense of distance. A man standing on a railway
cannot judge of the nearness of the engine; nor a man behind a target
of the approach of the arrow; whereas, seen obliquely, the flight is
clear. Hence a long hop is not a puzzling length, because there is
time to ascertain the second part of the course or rebound. A toss is
easy because one course only. The tice also, and the half-volley, or
any over-pitched balls, are not so puzzling, because they may be met
forward, and the two parts of the flight reduced to one. Such is the
philosophy of forward play, intended to obviate the batsman’s chief
difficulty, which is, with the second part, or, the rebound of the
ball.