Quote:
Originally Posted by fredfertang
Better pitches was one of the main factors, although they were already improving by the late 1890s when the Golden Age began, I suspect the main factor was an increase in tactical awareness - after the Great War the devil-may-care attitude of the Golden Age went - there were more professionals in the English game, and the batter's' income depending on weight of runs, so they took fewer risks, and the bowlers (rather more of whom were pros) weren't about to make their lives any easier
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Yeah. The tracks were much improved from the 1890s onwards - almost overnight. You could make the argument that is takes a generation to learn their cricket on these tracks as children and develop their game to take full advantage of the batsman friendly conditions.
Of course the game was also evolving. Pad play had been around years but was becoming less of a cowardly thing to do. Batsmen were getting in to line far more regularly and had 2 lines of defence. While LBWs rose dramatically, so did runs scored.