SPORTING ASPECT

Euphonics v. Crakes

By JOHN ARLOTT WISDEN, contemporary chronicle of our cricket, is constantly revised as a work of reference. Since ' 1933 the ' Births and Deaths of Cricketers' section has been often pruned, so that now, apart from the greatest earlier names, it includes only players who have taken a defined part in first-class cricket in England and who died— or will die—after 1925.

So compactness is achieved at the sacrifice of contemplation. Only in the vast and kindly ramblings of the older volumes can the idle eye now come upon the Reverend T. Duodecimo Platt, who played for Harrow, and died in 1902. The Welsh schoolboy cannot find, in the up-to-date editions, echoes of his princely houses in the Cambridge fast-bowler of the Seventies —W. N. Powys—or that Dr. Cadwalader who played for Philadelphia. Dr. Damian is gone, along with Lawless and Lovering, Trudgett and Tryon; and the poet's eye misses the four Coleridges who played for Eton (and two of them for Oxford University as well).

Recalling a lesser literary eminence, ' Craig, A. (" The Surrey Poet "), d. July, 1909, aged 59' was there, with his poignantly incomplete data; now he, with many others, has lost his last line of immortality.

That Mr. T. S. Pix played for Harrow in 1824 has remained in my mind for over twenty years, but I had to turn to an old Wisden to find that he lived for seventy-six years after that great day.

It was intriguing to obey the instruction of the entry ' Blayds, Mr. E. (see Calverley, Mr. E.) ' and find—' (formerly Blayds) '. Why ?—Was some great fortune left him conditionally upon a change of name ?—or, for I see he was at Cambridge, was his reason reverence for the light verse of C. S. Calverley ?

The long series of 1914-1918 tragedies has come under the sub-editorial pencil. ' Balks, Gunner R, (Yorkshire Club Cricket) d. Oct. 26, 1918 ' has followed ' Childe-Pemberton, Major C. B. (Harrow) b. Sept. 27, 1853, d. at Potgeiter's Drift, Jan. 21, 1900' into the limbo of unnecessary reference; but their story is told afresh in—' Turnbull, Major M. J. (Camb. Univ. and Glamorgan) b. March 16, 1906, d. Aug. 5, 1944'.

I remember, too, a Dumas-musketeer cricketer- d'Albertanson, Mr. R.—and my disappointment at finding that his only quoted team was Sutton Valence School. More prosaically, there was Puddephatt, E. (Islington), born on January 11, 1831, and, seemingly—and, I hope, happily—still alive in 1923.

Few names--and no initials—are held in such reverence as those of cricketers. Which of us, as a lad, would have dreamt of referring to Stevens without the essential ' G. T. S.', Chapman without' A. P. F.' or even that Mr. Case of Somerset —whose team-mates called him ' Box '—without the initials C. C. C. ?

Sounds mean what association makes them mean, especially in the mind of the hero-worshipper. A Rhodes by any other name would bowl as well. It is hard to fall back on the ear alone, to realise that Trumper, for all its connotation of dashing batsmanship, is an ugly name; that Woolley, synony- mous with lordly strokes, sounds the same as ' woolly ': and that Hobbs and Bradman would be dull, unlovely sounds but for the memory of the two cricketers who bore them.

The oldest of after-dinner cricket games is that of picking imaginary teams and handsome names against ugly ones would be as good a match as any to while away the time in Hades.

The form of the very early cricketers is uncertain, so we may Allow Nyren and Beldham—how much more handsome, somehow than Beldam and, remember, he was 'Si' ver Billy' —to cancel out Hogsfiesh and Stevens, of Surrey, who was so often recorded in the score-sheets of the eighteenth century as ' Lumpy.' We must agree, too, I fancy, to omit the obvious puns of such crickety names as Fielder, Batson, Scorer, Driver, Holder and, prudently, Rashleigh. Mean hale, to pick on such as Pigg (Mr. Herbert, of Cambridge University and Hertfordshire) is to labour a joke which must have wearied him all his life.

Grace, of course, is clearly first choice for the Euphonics and his own choice of partner—' Give me Arthur '—brings with him to the wicket Shrewsbury,. a name of medieval rich- ness.

R. L. Stevenson's theory about the beauty of v ' and ' sounds is not valid for Vialls, nor for Vidler: Vyse will not do, and some lurid Victorian work of fiction has left me with the feeling that the name Vibart is villainous. Vane, Vizard and Valentine are tempting however, and Verity, doubly handsome, in both sound and meaning, must be in- cluded. From Verity, clearly, must follow Trueman. Perhaps. too, it is the ' v ' in the word Graveney that gives it a quality as mellow as his batting.

The names from Debrett will not, alas, strengthen the side very much. Lord Burghley (1825-95) did not get a blue' at Cambridge. The Earl of Redesdale is described only as a ' Patron ' of Gloucestershire cricket, and Venables (R. G.) never progressed beyond the Rugby eleven. M. A. Noble will do for an opening bowler, though, and Lyon, with its heraldic ring, provides us with a wicketkeeper.

I am tempted by d'Ornellas but it is followed by ' Private F. A. (Ottawa) '—not quite a good enough player, I fear. So, for the Gallic word-taste, we might have C. A. 011ivierre of Derbyshire and the West Indies, or Lionel Palairet, de Courcy or de Lisle but that the Victorian Hampshire elevens included ' Champion de Crespigny, Mr. P. A.' whose claim must be unquestionable. Mead—as pleasantly pastoral as the Middle- sex opening pair of Lee and Dales—the simple dignity of Lord, and the rounded history of Rhodes, and the first eleven is complete.

If there is to be a twelfth man, let it be J. W. Juniper, of Sussex, who was a bare twenty-three when he died in 1885.

Even then, we have omitted Rylott—in full, even more impressively, Arnold Rylott—who played for Leicestershire; the country richness of Haygarth and Appleyard, the courtesy of Knightley-Smith, the picturesque Ravenhill and the gentle sound of Aird.

The rougher-sounding batting we have already started with Trumper and I think perhaps Fuller Pilch makes him a harsher partner even than Ubsdell (G., of Hants.). Sprot, of the same county, however, makes an explosive number three. Perhaps Nicholas Wanostrocht's assumption for cricket purposes, of the name Felix ' excludes him; but Curgenven we must have, and Gaukrodger, J. Smurthwaite, and J. W. Zulch. in place even of Goatly (E. G., Surrey) or one. of the three Baggallays. Sugg, I feel is slightly to be preferred to Sprinks. who has a merry sound, and Jiggins, who. I am sure, was amiable enough.

A relatively unknown—Stileman-Gibbard (Bedfordshire)— would force his way into the side but that we need a fast bowler—Kortright—perhaps the fastest of all. Snary, of Leicestershire, is preferred' to Stuckey (Victoria) and Slinn (Yorkshire) and Pougher—pronounced Puffer '—rounds of the eleven. As twelfth man, Runting must probably give way to the surprising uncertainty of Unstead (J., of Kent).

So, the two elevens might he: Euphonics Crakes Fuller Pilch V. Trumper E. M. Sprot J. W. Zulch F. Sugg H. G. Curgenven J. Smurthwaite Crespigny G. Gaukrodger C. J. Kortright H. C. Snary A. D. Pougher Twelfth Man,: J. Unstead. Dr. W. G. Grace Arthur Shrewsbury T. Graveney Philip Mead M. D. Lyon Thomas Lord M. A. Noble P. A. Champion de Wilfred Rhodes Hedley Verity Freddie Trueman Twelfth Man : J. W. Juniper