With regard to the order in which a captain should send in his men, a good deal depends on the strength of the batting he has at command. With a weakish batting team it is, in our opinion, always better to send in the best batsman first, assuming of course he has no objection to the place. It is of great importance to give the best batsman every possible advantage, and the men who go first to the wickets have a great advantage over the others. They have less waiting for their innings, and consequently less of that restless nervousness from which few men are free; they have the best of the wicket; they have often loosish bowling just at first, before the bowlers have warmed to their work; and, last but certainly not least, they are batting a new ball. Few people realise what a difference a new ball makes to the batsman; it goes cleaner and firmer off the bat than an old one, and, what is better than all, a hard new ball is much more difficult to twist than one that has had a hundred runs made off it. Let anyone look at an old bowler who has to begin the bowling: his first action is to rub the ball on the ground in the hope of taking off even a little of its slippery newness; it is not, however, till after its surface has been considerably worn that it begins to take much notice of any twist, at any rate on a hard ground.
With such advantages to be gained by going in first it would be a pity not to give the best batsman the chance of making a good start for his side. A good start gives confidence to the shaky batsman, and shows the bowlers that they are not to have it all their own way. Sometimes the best batsman on a side does not care about going in first; if so, it is always well to consult his wishes and humour him, but he should never go in later than second wicket. With the best batsman should go some steady correct bat, one who plays the game thoroughly and does not take liberties with the bowling. In these days of perfect grounds it is a vast mistake to send in first a regular 'sticker,' one who scores at the rate of eight or ten an hour. The stonewallers of our cricket-fields have a great deal to answer for in the heavy indictment against modern players
