TEST MATCH REFLECTIONS. UNDESIRABLE PRACTICES.

ENGLAND’S BAD RECORD.

By COLONEL PHILIP TREVOR, C.B.E.

The fifth and last match has ended as the other four Test matches ended, in the complete rout of the England team. Nor did the series come to an end harmoniously. E. R. Wilson and P. G. H. Fender, the only two amateurs (with the exception of the captain) in the English side, were “barracked” by a large and unruly section of the Australian crowd. The reason given for this unseemly demonstration was that those two cricketers had cabled home for publication statements which, in the view of the demonstrators, were not in accordance with fact, and criticisms which were not justified by the actual state of affairs. Only a very little while ago Lord Hawke made some wise and pertinent remarks, pointing out the undesirability of a cricketer criticising in the public Press the game in which he was taking part, and the comrades and the opponents who were also taking part in it. There is not the least doubt that the cricket world is solidly with Lord Hawke in his contention. Indeed, only one argument can, from the public point of view, be adduced in favour of the practice which Lord Hawke so rightly condemns. That argument amounts to this: “Your famous cricketer is an expert, and can give you what is known as the inside view.” Still, it is a specious argument at best. There are non-playing experts who, sitting, let us say, directly behind the bowler’s arm, are quite as capable of giving the inside view as the men who should be concentrating the whole of their time, attention, and energies upon the particular job which they have in hand. To be of the fullest value to his side your cricketer must be an out-and-out partisan. The mere handful of persons who support the practice which Lord Hawke, with almost universal approval, condemns maintain that at close of play the partisan cricketer can put himself into a purely judicial frame of mind and with the help of a pen can give the public a reasoned and impartial judgment upon play and players. Next morning he again becomes the partisan – next evening the judge, and so on ad infinitum. A cricketer, even if he is a famous cricketer, is only a man after all, and to do that sort of thing you need to be a super-man. But undesirable, and even, provocative, as the practice is, the unseemly “barracking” with which a section of the Sydney crowd retaliated upon Wilson and Fender is reprehensible in the extreme. No decent sportsmen either in England or in Australia will contend that two blacks make a white. “Barracking” is thoroughly unsportsmanlike, and no argument based upon provocation can defend it. Also, it is a negation in terms to talk of “good-natured barracking.” You can just as aptly talk of a kind tiger. The practice of barracking doubtless originated in Australia, but we have had samples of it imported over here. Indeed, I have witnessed at Lord’s (the headquarters of the game) the barracking of so popular and sportsmanlike a cricketer as Hendren, and that despite the fact that Hendren never played for his own hand in his life. He always plays for his side. The public have no right to call the tune. They pay their money and they take their chance. The policy of the cricket which they witness should be decided purely and solely by the two captains. If that policy is not to the liking of the spectator he can go outside and not come in again.