IT HAS NO MERRITT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 46, 24 February 1937, Page 6

IT HAS NO MERRITT.

The New Zealand cricket team to tour England this year has been selected, and there is agreement among the critics that the selectors have not been able to surmount the inherent weakness which has characterised onr cricket for the last decade—a laek of hostile bowling. There is no really outstanding bowler in the side. In batting the team is l as well equipped as the team of 1931, which played 32 first-class matches, won six, lost three and drew 23. Two of the Test matehes were drawn, and the other (the second) lost by an innings and 26 runs. The team of six years ago did have a capable and tried slow bowler in W. E. Merritt, who was easily the most prolific wicket-taker of the tour. This team has no Merritt. It has, instead, B. Griffiths, an improving slow bowler with a patchy record ranging irom very good to verv bad in interprovincial cricket—selected in the hope of steady play producing steady merit in his attack. His selection is an experiment, but whether or not he succeeds, New Zealand is confident the team will win more matches than it loses in England. When everything has been considered, one is left wondering whether the selectors have not made a mistake in leaving out A. M. Matheson, whose allround ability and temperament in eritical situations have been so frequently proved in pulling both Auckland and New Zealand teams out of the fire.