CHAPTER V
FIELDING
By S. L. Jessop
It has become almost an axiom of the game that more matches are lost by bad fielding than through any superexcellence of batting or bowling, and that this is really the case few will deny.
How many of those favoured mortals who participate in first-class cricket can call to mind instances of brilliant batting, followed up by capital bowling, all to be rendered null and void by the missing of a “sitter” by some lazy fieldsman whose thoughts were anywhere but on the game. Cricketers are but mortals, and catches will be missed as long as the game of cricket is played, but less mistakes would be made, especially in the slips, if fieldsmen would but pay the strictest attention to the game, and not allow their thoughts to wander. That chance that “Cain” gave to third slip, which might have turned defeat into victory, would in all probability have been accepted, had the culprit’s thoughts not been too much engrossed in the choice of theatres that evening for his fiancée; and to such causes as these, if one could but read the thoughts of those at fault, many of the too frequent mistakes could be traced. Too much emphasis cannot be attached to this lack of attention, for one can but judge from one’s own experience.
That fielding, the most important branch of the game, has deteriorated during even the past five or six years may be accepted as a true bill, and we can only look for improvement to those who have the rising generation under their charge. No one can expect to become a good fieldsman without assiduous and often irksome practice, and this, combined with the undue prominence bestowed on batting, may account somewhat for the deterioration. A batsman, by scoring 50 runs, feels that he may have had a material hand in the success of his side, and in the same way so does a bowler who takes five or six wickets, for they both have something tangible to show in the score-sheet. True, the fieldsman may have helped the bowler by a brilliant catch or two, but there is no record of the amount of runs he may have saved. Thus it is that a little selfishness may crop up, for whereas the fieldsman may feel that, like the spoke of a wheel, he is only part of a whole, the batsman or bowler feels that he is an individual. Be the reason what it may, there is no doubt that the practice of fielding is much neglected, and as there is not that monotony in it that so frequently crops up in batting achievements, it is difficult to understand the cause of that neglect. When one considers that the best batsman in the world is not absolutely certain of scoring a run, and that a good fieldsman nearly always saves 20 or 30, the importance of fielding can at once be appreciated.
From a spectacular point of view there is no more stirring sight than to see eleven players, each of whom is striving his utmost to outdo the other in his efforts to save runs, bringing off catches that an ordinary field would not even attempt, and saving runs in a manner which at times borders on the miraculous. It is such a sight as this that saves cricket from becoming too monotonous. As has been mentioned before, sufficient practice is not indulged in; players who take great pains to improve their batting look upon fielding in the light of a “something” that has to be put up with, and as such only to be tolerated. Let these same players take half an hour’s practice every day for a month, and they will find an improvement in their fielding such as they would have hardly deemed possible. The only feasible way of obtaining practice is for some one to hit the ball to you from all sorts of distances, varying from 10 yards to 70, as this range will include different kinds of chances, from “slip” catches to catches in the long field. It is a good plan to use a light bat and hold it in the same manner that one would grasp a racquet, as by doing so one is able to impart a “cut” to the ball which closely resembles the spin that would result from a mis-hit to “cover” or a “snick” in the “slips.” Excepting at school, throwing at the wicket is seldom practised, which is a great mistake, for many a run has been saved and many a wicket taken by the accuracy of a smart return.
In classifying fieldsmen, one can roughly do so by saying that there are two kinds, those that field near the wicket and those that field in the out-field, and these latter are in the minority. In the same manner, fielding may be dissolved into two parts, namely, ground fielding and catching. Ground fielding has been brought to a state of perfection for which the improvement in the modern cricket-grounds is in a large manner responsible. To become a good ground fieldsman one must be able to judge the pace of the ball to a nicety; otherwise, although one may succeed in stopping it, one will fail to gather the ball accurately, and consequently will not save the run. The fieldsman who excels is the one who, gathering the ball accurately, returns it to the keeper or bowler with one and the same action. The time saved by this almost simultaneous action of stopping and returning the ball is of immense value to fielders in the long field, not only in the saving of singles, but also in the running out of unwary batsmen. When a ball is travelling along the ground, the first duty of a fieldsman is if possible to get in front of it, drawing the legs close together, so that, should the ball through any irregularity in the turf bump over the outstretched hands, it will be impeded by the fieldsman’s body. He must be equally certain with right or left hand in stopping those hits that he cannot get to with both hands, and there may be a time when it is absolutely necessary to use his foot in order to save runs. This method, useful and indispensable though it may be at times, is, one is sorry to say, becoming a little too general. Whenever possible the hand should always be used, and only as a desperate last chance should the foot be resorted to.