At Scarborough yesterday the Australian eleven started. the Jast fixture of theft tour. Mr. Woodfull and his team have sclifeved the main object of their Qiwrney. They return with the Ashes. With this mythical trophy they.carry back home a deservedly high reputation as cricketers and sportsmen, and their captain, who, celebrated nis 34th birthday on the very day the fateful match at the Oval was decided, has won special appreciation by his modest and yet extraordinarily efficient handling of his team, In no small measure has the success of a not too strong bowling attack been due to.the careful nursing and judicious encouragement which the young bowlers have been able to obtain from their captain. In the - Test Matches, the Australians lost at Trent Bridge, won at Lords, had the better of the drawn games at Leeds and the Old Trafford, and overwhelmingly defeated the English team at the Oval. There can therefore be little question of the superiority of the touring side over any possible English combination. Only one county, Gloucestershire, was able to give them anything like a fright, and Gloucestershire was champion county. Averages are not very satisfactory media for assessing cricket values, but it is of interest to note that in addition to D. G. Bradman, whose average for the five matches worked.out at the stupendous figure of 199.14, the Australians had no Jess than four batsmen whose average exceeded the ha! century. England's two top bats men were Sutcliffe and K. S. Duleepsinhji, with averages of 872 and 59.42 respect Turning to the bowling, the cost of an English wicket Australia ranged from 45.61 down to 27.62., whereas the cost of an Australian wicket to England went from 73 down to 33.42. Of the ten "centuries" made in the Test Matches, England claimed four and Australia six, of which D. G, Bradman had the Mon's share, Cricketers. will ponder over many aspects of this tour with mixed feelings. The Australians have strengthened the view that the Test Matches nowadays are regarded by the tourists as all-important events. The games with the counties have been treated, with very few exceptions, as if they were nothing more than practice This, although inevit-perhaps, owing to the interest now taken in the Tests, is not viewed with great enthusiasm by cricketers. With all due respect to the Australians,. county cricket still gives the real spirit of the game. The introduction of the timeless Test puts quite a different complexion on the pla; The batsman is concerned with keeping up his wicket rather than making runs. The effect of this development cannot be dogmatically assessed. If these tours are financially profitable, no doubt they will continue.
Turning from this debatable' point to the examination of the standard of play, it may be asserted that the chief feature of modern cricket lies not so much in the supremacy of the batsmen as in the enormous change which has taken place in the efficiency of the field. It is really only in recent years that fielding has developed into a definite campaign, elaborated to take into consideration the peculiarities of each individual batsman. Yet, with all this improvement in fielding, the bowlers seem to be less able to take wickets readily. England has to deplore the absence of fast bowlers of undoubted stamina. If a Walter Brearley had been on the English side this season, Dox Bradman would probably' not have returned to. Australia with so many records his bag. On the Australian side, the exception of C..V. Grimmett, the bowling was hardly up to international form. A final word should be
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.