[CHAPTER IX.]
HOW TO SCORE.
(By W. G. Grace.)
Ask any player who has scored over a hundred in an innings if he felt any particular influence at work on the morning of the match, and he will probably answer in the negative; but press him, and he will admit that he felt fit and well, and that the feeling was owing to a good night’s rest, together with the careful training of days and weeks. I am aware that there are exceptions to this rule, and that players have been known to score largely after a night of high feasting and dancing; but in my own experience, whilst admitting that occasional freaks of this kind have been followed by moderately large scores, I cannot recollect many of my big innings that were not the results of strict obedience to the rules which govern the training for all important athletic contests. Temperance in food and drink, regular sleep and exercise, I have laid down as the golden rule from my earliest cricketing days. I have carefully adhered to this rule, and to it in a great degree I attribute the scores that stand to my name in cricket history, and the measure of health and strength I still enjoy.
Early in the season every cricketer knows the difficulty of getting his eye in, but though he may be disappointed at the small score attached to his name match after match, he plays steadily on, trusting that by constant practice the coveted hundred will come. If he hopes to score largely he must be careful in his manner of living and moderate in all things, even though nature may have blessed him with exceptional wrist power and sight.
The capacity for making long scores is not a thing of a day’s growth, and it may be years before strength and skill come and enable the young cricketer to bear the fatigue of a long innings. He cannot begin too early to play carefully and earnestly, and in all club and school practice the lad should play as if he were engaged in an important match, and the result depended upon his individual efforts. In my own case, thanks to careful guidance, I was early taught to keep my wicket up, never to hit recklessly, always to play straight or good-length balls with force, and if possible away from the fielders. Habits of that kind thoughtfully cultivated will not desert you in first-class cricket. Great scores at cricket, like great work of any kind, are, as a rule, the results of years of careful and judicious training and not accidental occurrences.
If you have occasion to travel a considerable distance to play, make an effort to get to your destination the night before, or at least some time before, the match begins. There is nothing so fatiguing to the eyesight as a long railway journey, and going straight from the railway station to the wicket is often fatal to long scoring.
I have tried hard, especially of late years, to arrange so that I could reach the ground in good time and save everything in the shape of hurry or bustle. There are but few cricket grounds within a hundred miles of each other where the light and conditions are alike, and it takes some time for eye and mind to accommodate themselves to new surroundings. You will find it just as trying to play in a blaze of sunshine, after three days of smoke and leaden skies, as you will in a change from the sunny south to the bleak, sunless north.
You must also not only bear in mind the vast importance of reaching the ground in good time, but the greater importance of getting five or ten minutes’ batting practice before the innings begins. Very few grounds are the same as regards the way in which the ball rises off the pitch, even if the light be similar to that you have been playing in for days, and it requires nothing short of a genius for the game to change from a fast to a slow wicket, and play with the same ease and confidence.
I shall not readily forget an experience that came to me in 1871, when I travelled from London to Brighton to play for the Gentlemen against the Players for the benefit of John Lillywhite. Being very much younger than I am now, I was blessed with clearness of vision and quickness of action that suited themselves very readily to most conditions of light and ground. Perhaps it was the inexperience of youth that led me to put off reaching the old Brunswick ground at Hove until the moment of beginning my innings. This I know, I felt as fit as ever I did in my life, walked to the wicket with confidence, and took my guard carefully to the bowling of J. C. Shaw. He was on at the sea-shore end, and there was a glare on the water, delighting the artistic eye I have no doubt, but to me shifting and dancing like a will o’ the wisp. There is no need to deny the fact, I was all abroad to his first ball, and knew it had beaten me before it came within two yards of me. I tried hard to play it, but the ominous rattle told me I had failed, and I returned to the pavilion and made the mental note. The dazzling light, the railway journey, and want of five minutes’ practice did it. I had no desire to repeat the performance in the second innings, and had little fear of doing so. I took care to have some practice, and scored 217, my brother G. F. made 98, and we increased the total by 240 runs in two and a half hours.
There is this also to be said in favour of five or ten minutes’ batting practice before a match, that it enables you to test pads, gloves, and shoes. To have the fastening of a glove or pad break off when you are well set is a disagreeable and annoying interruption. It takes some time to put things right, and when you return to the wicket, the confidence you felt has very likely to a great extent deserted you. And how often have you placed your boots in your bag, all the spikes seemingly firm, to find one or two missing after you have been batting for a few minutes! One has gone out of the toe of your boot, and you play forward to a ball, miss your footing and get stumped; or one has vanished from the heel, and you are called by your partner for a short run, sent back again, slip, and get run out. Inattention to these apparently small points causes annoyance, and may prevent you from getting a long score.