Now let us briefly discuss the considerations that should guide the captain in the choice of his team. And perhaps the simplest and best way will be to assume that a captain has to choose the best team in England (our fictitious captain making the twelfth man on the side). The first thing he must do is to choose his bowlers, and, as we have said above, these must be the best four he can get, each one different from the others in style. He wants a fast bowler to begin with (and if the match is to be played on a hard wicket he will probably want two). He has Mold and Lockwood to choose from, undoubtedly the two best. If he wants one only, he must be guided by present form; whichever is bowling the best must be selected. Let us say he has selected Mold. This is No. 1. No. 2 must be a good left-hand bowler. Peel and Briggs are perhaps the only two at the present time who have good qualifications, and we think our captain would probably fix on Peel as being the best bowler of the two. No. 3--a medium-pace to fast round-arm bowler--is next wanted. Lohmann would be the very man, but since ill-health at the present date prevents his appearance on the field, let our captain bring into his team as No. 3 Lockwood. Surely he or Mold, if not both, will prove destructive. No. 4.--Our captain now wants a right-arm slow bowler accurate enough to keep down the runs (if it is necessary) on a hard true wicket, and powerful enough with the ball to take advantage of crumbled or sticky wickets. Who is he to take? C. M. Wells of Surrey and Cambridge, Flowers of Notts, Attewell of ditto, Wainwright of Yorkshire, A. Hearne of Kent, are all good names. The man for this place a few years ago would have been Alfred Shaw. What a fine bowler he was! Perhaps his best performance was in 1875, when for Notts _v._ the M.C.C. at Lord’s he bowled 162 balls for 7 runs and 7 wickets (bother the maidens: we don’t care how many of them he bowled!), and amongst these seven wickets were W. G. Grace, A. W. Ridley, C. F. Buller, and Lord Harris. In the same match, for the M.C.C., A. W. Ridley with his lobs had a good analysis for the two innings--208 balls, 46 runs, and 10 wickets. Our captain thinks for No. 4 he cannot do better than Wainwright, and we agree with him. No. 5--the wicket-keeper--must be G. McGregor of Cambridge and Middlesex. Alas! when this chapter was written for the first edition of this book Pilling was the wicket-keeper selected, and we then expressed a hope that his health would allow him to remain behind the stumps for many years to come. Pilling died a few years ago, but those who ever played with him will never forget the excellence of his calm and quiet wicket-keeping, nor the gentleness and courtesy which graced his whole character. No. 6.--Now our captain has got to fill up six places; he has up to the present provided for getting rid of the opposite side: he now turns his attention to the selection of his batsmen. W. G. Grace first, no one disputes.