POACHING N.Z. PLAYERS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 261, 3 November 1932, Page 16

POACHING N.Z. PLAYERS.

THE LANCASHIRE RAID. MERUIT!" S DISQUALIFICATION. (By Telegraph.—Special to "Star.") CHRISTCHURCH, this day. Mr. Arthur Donnelly, for several years chairman of the management committee of the Spw Zealand Cricket Council, has made a statement on the Lancashire raid on Dominion cricket. He was closely concerned with the arrangements for both the tours of England, and travelled with the New Zealand team 'in 1931 from the Test match at Lord's to the end of the tour. Dealing with the financial aspect of leading players taking up the game abroad professionally, Mr. Donnelly remarks:— l "The New Zealand Cricket Council until this year has had little money or nonie at all, and our . major cricketing enterprises have been financed in the first' .instance for years .past by the personal credit of members of t'lie committee, who are not rich men. This is, I think, the first year for many that the committee has not guaranteed the council for large.but varying sums. "When the New Zealand team went to England the possible p.ersonal liability of. members of the committee was nearly, £10,000. Loss was avoided, .but the risk was there, and our consolation at that time was the knowledge that we had behind us Mr. Arthur Sims, an old New Zealand .player who in the last 20 years, has done more for New Zealand cricket and said less about it than any man in New Zealand except Mr. Reese. "It has been s;-iid that our players have a right to consult their '.personal interests, and that' right I freely admit. I say there are duties as well as rights, and an elementary duty is to keep one's word, unless on . application before t'h'e "breach' one is released." Dacre Starts the Trek. "In 1927 C. C. Dacre New Zealand, to go to Gloucestershire, and as a matter of policy the committee, decided that all players in 1931 should-be required to undertake that they would not agree to go to England for a period of two years from the date of the return- o£ the team,", says Mr. Donnelly. "Before their departure in 1931 I personally explained the agreement to all the players. During the tour some players were sounded by agents of the various leagues. I was informed at once by the players concerned of the negotiations which, at any request, then ceased." It was not until the 1931 New Zealand team left England that Mr. Donnelly -was informed by Lord Hawke that W. E. Merritt' liad signed up with the Rishton Club in .the Lancashire League, and lie was a little ashamed to admit that he knew nothing about it. A Conspiracy of Silence. Merrittfp- agreement with Rishton was made in August, 1931, and no doubt the •fact (.undisclosed by t'he player himself) was not published sooner in order to keep the New Zealand Council ignorant of it until the team had left the Old Country. Mr. Donnelly goes on to say:— "I cabled to Lowry at Panama for confirmation and was told that the report was true. Merritt, therefore,' went to Eng- 1 land on definite conditions, fully explained and thoroughly understood, and therefore broke his' definite agreement. ! "The -council has decided that he will not again ibe asked to play for New Zealand and, in my opinion, he should not play again for Canterbury. I do_ not express this opinion in' any vindictive way, because, I am now, and have been, on the best of.terms with Merritt since I first knew him when I selected him for Canterbury against Otago in 1927. "Merritt had been advised by the solicitors for the Rishton Club when settling a more'ibinding agreement that the agreement with the New Zealand Council was, as -we knew it to be, unenforceable at law. It was binding in but in no other way. In' August. 1931, if I had known that Merritt had broken his word to the council, then, as its representative .in charge of the team, I would have allowed. Merritt to play again."