The Gold Bat | Page 2

been rather more even
than the average, and the team had only just pulled the thing off by a
couple of tries to a goal. Otway expressed an opinion that the school
had played badly.
"Why on earth don't you forwards let the ball out occasionally?" he
asked. Otway was one of the first fifteen halves.
"They were so jolly heavy in the scrum," said Maurice, one of the
forwards. "And when we did let it out, the outsides nearly always
mucked it."
"Well, it wasn't the halves' fault. We always got it out to the centres."
"It wasn't the centres," put in Robinson. "They played awfully well.

Trevor was ripping."
"Trevor always is," said Otway; "I should think he's about the best
captain we've had here for a long time. He's certainly one of the best
centres."
"Best there's been since Rivers-Jones," said Clephane.
Rivers-Jones was one of those players who mark an epoch. He had
been in the team fifteen years ago, and had left Wrykyn to captain
Cambridge and play three years in succession for Wales. The school
regarded the standard set by him as one that did not admit of
comparison. However good a Wrykyn centre three-quarter might be,
the most he could hope to be considered was "the best since
Rivers-Jones". "Since" Rivers-Jones, however, covered fifteen years,
and to be looked on as the best centre the school could boast of during
that time, meant something. For Wrykyn knew how to play football.
Since it had been decided thus that the faults in the school attack did
not lie with the halves, forwards, or centres, it was more or less evident
that they must be attributable to the wings. And the search for the weak
spot was even further narrowed down by the general verdict that
Clowes, on the left wing, had played well. With a beautiful unanimity
the six occupants of the first fifteen room came to the conclusion that
the man who had let the team down that day had been the man on the
right--Rand-Brown, to wit, of Seymour's.
"I'll bet he doesn't stay in the first long," said Clephane, who was now
in the bath, vice Otway, retired. "I suppose they had to try him, as he
was the senior wing three-quarter of the second, but he's no earthly
good."
"He only got into the second because he's big," was Robinson's opinion.
"A man who's big and strong can always get his second colours."
"Even if he's a funk, like Rand-Brown," said Clephane. "Did any of you
chaps notice the way he let Paget through that time he scored for them?
He simply didn't attempt to tackle him. He could have brought him

down like a shot if he'd only gone for him. Paget was running straight
along the touch-line, and hadn't any room to dodge. I know Trevor was
jolly sick about it. And then he let him through once before in just the
same way in the first half, only Trevor got round and stopped him. He
was rank."
"Missed every other pass, too," said Otway.
Clephane summed up.
"He was rank," he said again. "Trevor won't keep him in the team
long."
"I wish Paget hadn't left," said Otway, referring to the wing
three-quarter who, by leaving unexpectedly at the end of the Christmas
term, had let Rand-Brown into the team. His loss was likely to be felt.
Up till Christmas Wrykyn had done well, and Paget had been their
scoring man. Rand-Brown had occupied a similar position in the
second fifteen. He was big and speedy, and in second fifteen matches
these qualities make up for a great deal. If a man scores one or two tries
in nearly every match, people are inclined to overlook in him such
failings as timidity and clumsiness. It is only when he comes to be tried
in football of a higher class that he is seen through. In the second
fifteen the fact that Rand-Brown was afraid to tackle his man had
almost escaped notice. But the habit would not do in first fifteen
circles.
"All the same," said Clephane, pursuing his subject, "if they don't play
him, I don't see who they're going to get. He's the best of the second
three-quarters, as far as I can see."
It was this very problem that was puzzling Trevor, as he walked off the
field with Paget and Clowes, when they had got into their blazers after
the match. Clowes was in the same house as Trevor--Donaldson's--and
Paget was staying there, too. He had been head of Donaldson's up to
Christmas.
"It strikes me," said Paget, "the school haven't got over the holidays yet.

I never saw such a lot of slackers. You ought to have taken thirty points
off the sort of team