Cricket challenge
It has not been a happy MCC tour of Australia. For the remaining two Tests, moreover, an .Australian team undiminished in its ebullience IS likely to rub the message of humiliation more deeply into the English, and the disintegration of the Denness team is certain to proceed apace. The question that must, of course, preoccupy the authorities is what they do now and, more Particularly, whether they can do what is needed before the Australians come to this country in the summer. There is not time to Change the training of British batsmen, nor to alter the whole style and character of county cricket so as to breed batsmen capable of facing Up to Thomson and Lillee. But a good deal can, Perhaps, be done to select a more capable side. The first principle to be adopted is that of Australian selection: MCC must simply pick the best eleven cricketers they can find and choose a captain from among them. Thus the dreadful spectacle of a captain not good enough to command a place in his own side will be avoided, and the indecision created at the heart of team Planning by Denness's manifest inadequacy will be avoided. Then, we must decide to pick the right kind of cricketer. For all their willingness and effort Willis and Arnold, besides not having the pace of their Australian opposite numbers, lacked fire. Yet John Snow has been in Australia during the tour and, faced with the challenge of a Test match, was likely to give as good as his team got in the exchanges had he been called Upon. There were other cricketers left at home — Basil d'Oliveira is probably the first of them — inclined to treat hostile bowling not as something to duck from, but as a welcome Challenge, and their recall to international cricket could put a very different complexion on a summer series that now looks lost before it begins. The first thing to do is to seek to reproduce Australian aggression; and that is a far from impossible challenge.
Previous page
