He missed the easiest catches, he got leg before wicket, he stopped still in the middle of a run to see if he would have time to finish it, and whenever he did manage to score one he was sure, in his excitement, to knock down his own wicket with a flourish of his bat.
In football it's no exaggeration to say he was more often on the ground than the ball itself, and was invariably of more service to the other side than to his own.

In fact, the possession of him got to be quite a joke.
"Who's going to win ?" asks some one, before a match begins.
"Which side is Billy Bungle on ?" is the counter question.
"Oh, he's on our side." "Then of course the other fellows will win," is the uncomplimentary conclusion; and Billy, poor boy, who overhears it, half chokes with wounded feelings, and tucks up his sleeves and goes into the game, determined for once he will disappoint those who mock at him.

Alas I scarcely has the ball been kicked off than he gets in the way of everybody he ought not to get in the way of, and lets the others pass him; he collars his own men, and kicks the ball towards his own goal, and falls down just in time to cause half a dozen of his side to tumble over him, and just as the ball rises, straight as an arrow, to fly over the enemy's goal, his unlucky head gets in the way and spoils everything.

No wonder he is in very poor demand as an ally.
Now, the question is, is it altogether Billy's fault he is such a duffer?
Of course it is, say nineteen out of every twenty of my readers.

Any one with an ounce of brains and common sense could avoid such stupid blunders.