Written by SJS on Sydney Barnes-
He bowled leg breaks at medium pace. He also swung them in at the same pace and worse of all he swung them in, very sharply from oustside the off stump, they pitched on the leg stump, broke away like leg breaks and knocked off stumps out of the ground !!
Barnes had..... in the eyes of most mature batsmen of the day - an aloof 'lone wolf' appearance, six feet tall, a hatchet jaw, piercing, unsmiling eyes, and a lean hungry look, hungry for wickets....
he remained a man apart, a 'mercenary', so to say. I remember him as a p[layer who most times seemed to isolate himself on the field; he wasn't given to chatter at the fall of a wicket. He sent a wind of antagonism blowing over cricket fields everywhere.
...Orielly was supposed to announce in his every motion...that he hated the sight of all batsmen. Compared with Barnes, O'rielly was a font of beneficence and geniality.Yet A>C> Maclaren vowed that no bowler ...was so easy to manage as Barnes. ' I would toss him the ball, let him set his own field - and that was that....'
On a certain historical occasion, an England captain did not toss the ball to Barnes...Douglas (captaining in the absence of Warner) ran ahead and cammandeered the new ball. Barnes said to a colleague, ' What's he taking the new ball for - is he opening with Mr Foster'
Douglas did open the England attack that day at Sydney, December 15th 191. Australia compiled 411....and won by 146 runs. Barnes : 35 overs; 5 maidens: 107 runs: 3 wickets and 30 overs: 8 maidens: 72 runs: 1 wicket.
In the next match...Douglas tossed the new ball to Barnes....It is as wel known in cricket history, as in history proper the batles of Hastings and Waterloo are known...
Barnes demolished the strong first line of Australian batsmanship by overthrowing Bardsley, Kelleway, Hill and Armstrong in five overs for one run only.
At lunch Australia had somehow acquired 34 for 4; after an hour and ten minutes of ruthless, smooth, rythmic action, Barnes had bowled 9 overs: 6 maidens: 11runs: for 4 wickets.
The astounding fact of this renowned piece of bowling is that Barnes was suffering from some dizziness, actually saying to his captain that he'll have to 'chuck it - I can hardly see the other end'
In this Australian first innings his final figures were 23 - 9 - 44 - 5
In the series , which England won eventually, Barnes had 32 wickets at 21.6 runs each. He was 38 years old then.
There is a popular misconception that Barnes took most of his wickets against South Africa. This is not true. While he did demolish South Africa in the 7 games he p[layed against them, his performance against Australia was not to be scoffed at.
In 20 Ashes games, Barnes took 106 test wickets at 21.6 each getting a five wicket haul 12 times.
England played Australia 43 times between 1901 (when Barnes made his debut) and 1914 (when he played his last game) of these Barnes played less than half.
This, inspite of the fact that he was by fasr the most devastating bowler IN TESTS during this period with 189 wickets in 27 tests(87 against SAF in 7 games besides those against Australia.
He was easily the most successful bowler in the Ashes in this period (with his 102 in 20 games) which included great bowlers on both the sides,
England used, besides Barnes...
- Rhodes 81 in 33
- Braund 46 in 20
- Hirst 46 in 19
- Blythe 41 in 9 games
- Foster 34 in 8 (32 in one series mentioned above)
And its not as if he had bad form because of which he was dropped.
There is also a fallacy about easy wickets against South Africa. Well England disnt include him in all games. They plated three series against South Africa during this period without Barnes and here are the results.
- 1905-06 (In SAfrica) England lost 1-4 !!
- 1907 (In England) England won 1-0 ( 2 games drawn)
- 1909-10 (In S Africa) England lost 2-3 !!
A grand score of 4 to 7 (with 2 draws - Clearly if any team looked like being the minows. it wasnt S Africa
Then, with Barnes ending his career, at the age of 39 he was played in the series in England in 1912 (also involving Australia).
- England won 3-0 Barnes doing it single handedly with 34 wickets in 3 games at 8.3 runs each !!!
- Then they took him to S Africa at the ripe old age of 40 and in the four tests that he played, he took a record (most likely never to be equalled) 49 wickets (in 4 tests mind you) at 10.9 each. England won the series 4-0.
Surely it was only Barnes who made S Africa look like they couldnt tell which end of the bat to hold not anyone else in England. This was more a commentary on the ever improving genius of Barnes rather than South Africa being such no-hopers.
England during this period were not a very strong side. They could ill afford to keep a bowler like Barnes out, yet they did. It is anybody's guess what his tally (189 in 27 tests) would have been had he played those additional 20 games against Australia and the 15 juicy ones (for Barnes alone) against the Proteas !!
