Games. [f. LOB v.]
1. Cricket. A slow underhand ball.
1875. Times, 29 June, 12/1. At 67 Mr. Greenfield tried three overs of lobs.
1882. Daily Tel., 20 May, 2/7. Humphreys tried his lobs once more, and got rid of Garrett almost directly.
1891. W. G. Grace, Cricket, 250. An article on bowling would not be complete without some reference to slow underhand, or, to use the familiar word, ‘lobs.’
attrib. 1883. Standard, 3 Aug., 6/5. Preston made a very poor show … against the lob bowling of Mr. Walker.
1888. Steel & Lyttelton, Cricket (Badm. Libr.), 160. Every batsman … knows the danger of playing wildly at under-hand ‘lobs.’… Occasional mistakes are made, no doubt, when an unexpected lob bowler appears.
2. Lawn-tennis. (See quot.) Also attrib. in lob-volley.
1890. Heathcote, Tennis (Badm. Libr.), 238. When a lob is about to drop near the base-line it is now generally returned either by the ‘lob-volley’…, which is a defensive stroke, or the player runs back and returns it again with a lob. Ibid., 242. The ‘lob’ is a ball tossed high in the air, and, if possible, over the opponent’s head…. As a ‘toss’ it was known and tolerated long before it was condemned as a ‘lob.’ Ibid., 245. The service, the stroke off the ground, the volley, the half-volley, and the lob.
