Cricket. [? Same word as prec.] (See quot. 1888.)
1870. Sporting Mag., Oct., 99. A fast Yorker is as disagreeable a first ball as an incoming batsman could receive.
1888. A. G. Steel, Cricket (Badm. Libr.), iii. 133. The ordinary definition of a ‘yorker’ is a ball that pitches inside the crease, and this, no doubt, is correct so far as it goes, but it does not go far enough. It really should be, any ball that pitches directly underneath the bat. It is quite possible for a man to be bowled out with a ‘yorker’ when he is two or three yards out of his ground, if he misjudges the ball, and allows it to pitch directly beneath his bat, although the ball pitches as far from the crease as he is standing. The most deadly sort of ‘yorker,’ however, is the one that pitches about three or four inches inside the crease.
