This, after all, is my chief plea for all-roundness: not merely that probably much time will be given to Cricket anyhow, and that the player may as well learn the whole of Cricket; not only that thus his play will be pleasanter (or less dull), more useful to his health and physical development, more useful to his side, more useful to Cricket itself, but also that he will be better prepared for other games and other occupations, no matter what they are or shall be. He is a handy man, a footy and leggy man (if the ugly words may be pardoned, because they mean much), a ready man, disciplined and patient, yet alert and quick here and anywhere.
If you are going to play Cricket at all, or even to watch Cricket at all, all-roundness is worth while. Otherwise your days of fielding or of watching will be for the most part wasted; your minutes of batting will not grow into quarter-hours, half-hours, hours; your bowling will never have even a minute at all. Be a specialist if you like, but don’t be only a specialist. Try if you cannot do the other things at least moderately well.
Within the dominion of batting also there is need for all-roundness. Mr. C. B. Fry aptly remarks:—“The great defect of school coaching is that boys are taught to play forward and nothing else. Boys are not taught to play back or to use their feet properly, either in turning to place the ball or in running out to drive; nor are they taught to alter their play according to the state of the wicket.”
He himself is an all-round batsman. So is W. G.; as one of his innumerable admirers says:—“What W. G. did was to unite in his mighty self all the good points of all the good players, and to make utility the criterion of style. He founded the modern theory of batting by making forward and back play of equal importance, relying neither on the one nor the other, but on both.”
All-roundness is of value to every player—all-roundness in Cricket generally; all-roundness in the special departments of batting, and of fielding; to be able merely to catch well, or merely to stop well, or merely to run well, or merely to throw in well, must not content the player.
CHAPTER VI.
FAULTS IN PLAY AND PRACTICE.
No part of this book do I edit with such confidence as the part that deals with faults. I seem to have had every one of a certain class, though not want of endurance and strength, nor a bad eye, nor unwillingness; ignorance I had, not apathy. My chief sin—of which I shall speak below—was that I tried to practise the whole rather than its parts; I had matches, games, nets in abundance, and a few fielding lessons, but made hardly any progress.
And so it is with most. They try the whole—or at least the whole stroke—all together at first, seldom if ever concentrating their attention on any one part. They do what is natural, and this is usually “wrong.” They have no method of learning, except repetition which will only increase and ingrain the faults. Authorities recommend net-practice; but much of it is surely next to useless until the A B C has been mastered by batsman and bowler. If there are three bowlers at a net, the batsman gets excessive variety of bowling, the balls follow one another in too quick succession, each dulling the memory of the previous two; after the stroke—in which there is little incentive for carefulness—the batsman does not recover balance and prepare to run; the bowler has small inducement to lead up to a special head-ball, as he would by a consecutive series in a game, and, besides, he gets the wrong intervals—not a series, then a rest, but a single ball, then a rest; last, and not least, there are few fielders.
Let us be more concrete, and point out a few of the definite faults which are encouraged rather than removed by ordinary net play and games.
Stand directly behind the wicket in a school or college game, or behind a practice-net, and watch the batsman play forward; you will generally see the bat move up and back and then towards the ball in a far from straight line. That fault, it is well known, may be partially remedied by practice along a chalk line on the bed room or pavilion floor. “Play with a straight bat,” is the most familiar commandment. Besides, you may notice that his left foot does not go out nearly to the full extent of which a young and vigorous limb should be capable, and it does not go out straight; the bat may move towards the ball, but between it and the left foot is a great gap, through which the ball may pass. This is not the only fatal result. The left foot is sending the weight of the body too much to the left, to the leg-side, instead of straight down upon the ball: there is loss of power. Now does the fault lie with the hands and arms and shoulders that move and direct the bat, or with the left leg and foot? Sometimes with both, but nearly always with the left leg and foot, which tend to get away from their work. The lesson is obvious; but I have never heard any coach advise players to practise their feet alone. Yet how else can one learn to control them—that is, if one does not control them instinctively—except by concentrating the mind on them at first and until they will of themselves do what one wants? Mr. C. B. Fry alone seems to realise the importance of the feet—of their correct positions and movements. For years I have been studying them in Racquets and Tennis, for years I have been convinced that this is why, ceteris paribus, most unsuccessful players are unsuccessful; for years I have been training mine; and at length, instead of being always unready and out of position in my racket-games, as I was at Marlborough, I am now told that I am almost invariably ready and in position. If this practice be vitally indispensable at Racquets and at Tennis, if it has proved abundantly worth while, why not at Cricket also? In what essential respects do strokes at Cricket differ herein from strokes at these games?