The History Of Cricket (1957-58)

THE brutal, cold-blooded game of cricket was originally centred around a Mr. Wicket. He crouched down and had a ball hurled ferociously at him by his enemy the bowler.

But this sport was too one-sided, and so to add a little interest he placed three poles in front of him, as a protection. He named these sticks after himself and called them "a wicket "; and as a double protection his friend the batsman came out in front of the wicket, cudgel in hand, to protect him. When the ball soared towards the wicket-keeper the batsman knocked it out of the way, and ran down to the bowler's end, quite prepared to knock the malicious bowler senseless with his chunk of wood. But when he arrived there he often had a sudden spasm of fear, and he turned round and ran back. If a batsman did not run even once to defend his friend, he was called not a coward but a duck".

But the three players felt lonely and so they invited their grandfathers along, and called them umpires. Whenever the ball hit the wicket the first umpire waved frantically for help to a spectator, and the square-leg umpire (whose limbs appear quite normal to me) walked in and hastily re-erected the wicket-keeper's protective barrier. In 1950, the Minister of Works declared that to relieve unemployment he would introduce two shifts of nine men to stand around the batsman, their purpose being to regain the ball for the bowler. These men were called "ers," but as they stood around the field they were nicknamed "field-ers". If this sounds too violent to attract you there is always the more gentle and more subtle game of Rugby, but the writer's own choice would always be that noble and ancient pastime of the English - Tiddlywinks (derived from the name of the famous Norman baron, Tidd le Wink).

V. BRYANT, 2A