1 AM ALL ON the MCC's side if its proposals
for brighter county cricket are going to end those frustrating Saturdays spent watching the batting team crawling to safety. But will they? Restricting the number of leg-side fieldsmen to five may , abolish one sort of defensive bowling; but there are others, though these would at least make a change. And will limiting, first innings to eighty five overs apiece necessarily 'liven up the game? I should have thought that it might well do the opposite, since it will put a premium on defensive boWling, and captains will be very loath to risk a leg-spinner. To shift the defensive attitude of mind from the batting to the bowling side does not seem the right answer. Still, the MCC has shown itself anxious to cure the disease at present Paralysing the game, and it is up to the county captain§ to do the rest. I hope the MCC will now turn its attention to Test matches. Both sides in South Africa seem, like Henry VIII with hunting, to have been turning sport into a martyrdom.
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