in 1975, supported this view by holding that Grace "created modern cricket". But Grace's extraordinary skill had already been recognised very early in his career, especially by the professional bowlers. A very prescient comment was made by the laconic Yorkshire and England fast bowler Tom Emmett who, after playing against Grace for the first time in 1869, called him a "nonsuch" (without equal) who "ought to be made to play with a littler bat". H.S. Altham pointed out that for most of Grace's career, he played on pitches that "the modern schoolboy would consider unfit for a house match" and on grounds without boundaries where every hit including those "into the country" had to be run in full. Rowland Bowen records that 1895, the year of Grace's "Indian Summer", was the season in which marl was first used as a binding agent in the composition of English pitches, its benefit being to ensure "good lasting wickets". It was through Alfred Pocock's perseverance that Grace had learned to play straight and to develop a sound defence so that he would stop or leave the good deliveries and score off the poor ones. This contrasted him with E. M. who was "always a hitter" and whose basic defence was not as sound. However, as Grace's skills developed, he became a very powerful hitter himself with a full range of shots and, at his best, would score runs freely. Despite being an all-rounder, Grace was also an opening batsman. Bowling As a bowler, Grace belonged to what Altham calls the "high, home and easy school of a much earlier day". Using a roundarm action, Grace was adept at varying both his pace and the arc of his slower deliveries which worked in from the leg side of the pitch. The chief feature of his bowling was the excellent length which he consistently maintained. He originally bowled at a consistently fast medium pace but in the 1870s he increasingly adopted his slower style which utilised a leg break. He called his leg break a "leg-tweeker" but he put very little break on the ball, just enough to bring it across from the batsman's legs to the wicket and he invariably posted a fielder in a strategic position on the square leg boundary, a trap which brought occasional success. He was unusual in persisting with his roundarm action throughout his career, when almost all other