THE PAIRS CHAMPIONSHIP.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 17, 21 January 1926, Page 14

THE PAIRS CHAMPIONSHIP.

AUCKLAND IN THE RUNNING. (By TRUNDLEEU Section play in the pairs championship was nominally concluded on Tuesday, but there will probably be some misunderstanding as to which teams go forward to intersection play, to begin a? soon as the eligible teams are free from the intersection play in the rink?, the latter taking precedence. It does not follow that the section winners will go forward, as two sections are always played on each green, and the green winners are the only pairs which go forward. Angus and Pedpath. of Canterbury, the green winners path, of Canterbury, the green winners between sections C and D, won it two years ago at Christchurch. and promised well at Auckland the previous year, but had to leave before the intersection play concluded. McCallum. the winner in sec- ; tions I and J, won it in Auckland, with Edwards as his partner, but this time he is playing with Collins. Gibson and Wallace won in X and L. both being t successful Taieri players, and they are in" the intersection play in the rinks this morning, so that they will not be ready for the pairs until the former competition is disposed of. The other two members of the rink. Currie and W. B. Allan, won section I". Rigby and Tonkin, the winners of Sl,and 2*. were runnerslip in Auckland three years ago. when the final resulted in a tie. after a most sensational match, and had to be played all over again. Rigby was the singles champion of the previous year. Brackenridge and Aders have won sections S and T. The lead i> a member of the famous Wellington family. who used to play a family rink for Newtown, but are now spread out all over the Dominion. Best and Harraway won AA and 88. the lead being last year's single? champion, and the skip the champion of 1920. However, four Auckland pairs won their sections. These are Crawahaw and wright, St. Helier's; W. and S. Hardley. of West End: Mclntyre and Pilkingtcn, of Hamilton; Veare and J. F. Hosking. the latter playing for Carlton. of which club he is also a member, in addition to his old club. West End; Walker and Parker, Auckland. The St. Helier's pair, Crawshaw and Wright cannot play off agrains-t Mornington, to find the green winner, until they are disengaged in the rinks. W. and S. Hardley were defeated in the play off. but Parker and Walker (Auckland) and Deare and Hosking (Carlton ) both won the green play off, only to be defeated in the first round of intersection play, ■which is run on fhe sudden d-ea.th principle. Three Systems Compared. An attempt was made in Wellington last week, and also in Dunedin, to make up another team for the Australian carnival, which begins in Sydney on February 22. but as the entries closed the previous Saturday, the efforts were too late to be any good. There, i-s only one rink going from Auckland after all, the other intending competitors having backed down after giving full consideration to the most unpopular feature in the tournament, the "sudden death" system, under which it is run. They all consider that it is too much to expect competitors to spend five or six ireek-s. possibly more, and then get bumped out in one match. Bowling is not, like any other game; there i≤ too much luck in it to be absolutely sure that the best team ■will always win. and it is strange that prcgressie people like the bowlers I of Australia have not yet recognised this difference, and provided, for it in one of the two ways that are almost universal in New Zealand, viz., the two-life system. or in sections. The president of Xew

Sou;:i Wales. Mr. John Rankin, made a strong appeal for support, during the ' finals of the Christmas tournament, but ' at a later stage in the proceedings he practically condemned thei" system, although he no .uc-h intention tvhen he spoke. In congratulating the winning Carlton team i Ciarkson, Coutt. Bail.' and Truscott i. he laughingly added that he feh very proud to think that the team in which he himself had played ! had given the' winners the only loss ' they had sustained in their fifteen . matches. Getting right down to bedrock, i the only conclusion that one can draw | from his little fact, is that if Auckland, had been so foolish as to run off their big ' tournament on the out-of-date "sudden death" system, the strongest rink in the city would have been put out of action ! by a catch victory of a rink that had no ; possible chance of winning. In tennis the system is quite good, for the best player ; usually iviDv but it would be the height of absurdity to suggest that the rink i which was adorned by the distinguished patronage of the »-;siting vice-president of Xew South Wcles, was within streets of the crack Carlton rink. Run off in sections, nobody worries about a chance loss of this kind, and the same safety is preserved in the two-life system, but "sudden death" is absolutely unreliable in any tournament, where it is intended to make a reasonably good attempt to find the strongest team. During the Dominion tournament last week it turned out that the British visitors were not impressed with our two-life system, which they saw in the singles, nor with our section system.' which they saw in the rinks. However. this is no great' surpri&S. The Weekly Challenge. The Denison Pins did not stay long at Onehunga, the president of Ponsonby capturing them last Wednesday with a strong team. The holders started well, and had 10 on the board before the challenger; scored, in spite of some very fine saving -shots played by the Ponsonby ; skip. These then began to tell, and Pon-s-onby scored 16 while Onehunga stood still. maintaining about the same j relative position until the end: Chal- ! lengers (Ponsonby i, E. Harkins, E. Farrow, J. Torrance. A. J. Letham 22. v. Holders (Onehunga '. T. C. Schnackenberg. T. A. George. A. A. Kenny. A. A. Brown 17. Yesterday Road team played Ponsonby (T. A. Gentles, W. Battersby. W. Denison. T. Westi.. Dominion Road winning by 23 to 12, and the next challengers on the list ar3 i Carlton (G. R. Hosking), Mount Eden i (I. Turner), and Remuera (W. J. Wallace). Kgftfjgi