N.Z. DECLARE AT 324

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27274, 15 February 1954, Page 9

N.Z. DECLARE AT 324

Match At Cape Town ■ I From the Special N.Z-P.A. Correspondent with the team I

(Rec. 8 p.m.) CAPE TOWN. Feb. 13. Innings bf rare quality by Reid, outcliffe and Poore, and others, less colourful but of real value, by Chappfe, Mooney and Leggat gave New Zealand a useful first innings . d on the second day of the match with Western Province at Newlands today.

The loss of quick wickets after the tea interval with a corresponding slackening in the rate of scoring prevented New Zealand from establishing is position from which victory would be a probability rather than a possibility. Full credit for this must go to the bowlers, who, with the second new ball half an hour after tea, bowled with determination and purpose. At the close of play New Zealand had scored 324 for eight wickets, declared. and Western Province in its second innings had made 10 tor the loss of one wicket (Commins). In a day which provided 6000 spectators with much good cricket, Reid was again the central figure with an innings of 75 which can be described only in superlatives. In this tour Reid has often batted splendidly, and today s contribution was comparable with anything in earlier matches.

Yesterday Reid took his fiftieth first-class wicket on the tour; today he reached his 1000 runs in first-class matches and that this is the best double achieved by a player visiting South Africa since the war is some measure of what he has done for the New Zealand team day after day. Sutcliffe, just a little less aggressive, played another lovely innings and Poore’s batting was his boldest and best of the tour. Mooney and Chapple gave the side a good start with a partnership of 62 and late in the innings Leggat was beginning to show real form when he was run out.

The New Zealanders again enjoyed weather typical of their experience of Cape Town—a fine clear morning and a warm afternoon with enough chill in the breeze late in the day to warrant the use of sweaters. The pitch again played well and on it the Western Province bowlers were never much more than methodical and steady. Fielding was keen and generally efficient although Mooney was dropped at five and both Mac Gibbon and Bell had lives immediately before Sutcliffe declared. The contribution made in the morning by Mooney and Chapple was a good one and certainly helped to take the edge off the bowling, which never looked a particularly sharp weapon, but they missed many scoring opportunities. It was not, however, for of interest, for even in the first over Chapple, in oarticular, was looking for runs and hitting the ball ha-d But some luscious full tosses were allowed to bring only singles and in batting more than ?n hour and a half f nr 62, they seemed to have cost New Zealand the best chance of a really big score. Reid Magnificent It was obvious that Reid wax wop aware of the little time left if the New Zealanders were to end the tour with a win. He batted onlv 10 minutes before lunch but before the interval twice crashed van Ry ne veld to the boundary with square cuts maeje possible by smooth footwork and put ; nto effect with tremendovis power. He took 11 off van Ryneveld’s first

over after lunch and from that point was never at fault.

Reid has become a firm favourite with the Newlands crowd and it is little wonder he is held in such high regard. In his last throe innings here he has scored 321 runs with battin" which has always held stvle and strength in equal pronorHons. Today he was truly magnificent. After he had been in only 28 minutes he had scored 35 and passed Moonoy who had started 94 minutes earlier. Together they scored their first 50 in this same b r ief and dazzling perioa and Reid reached his own half century in 39 minutes—colourless figures but they do sugeest something of the power and maiestv of Reid in form. He drove magnificently, square cut with devastating force, hooked and pulled w’th great power and won runs with a much more delicate but most effective flick off his hio in the area behind square leg. One can on’v hone that New Zealand sees something o’ Reid in his present form, for it is as if he has graduated from raw youth to batting adulthood with a new awareness of his own ability. Reid today batted for an hour and a quarter for his 75 and there could not have been any in the crowd which welcomed# him back to the pavilion with an ovation of touching warmth who could not have wished for him to go on indefinitely. Mooney batted 160 minutes for his 48 and, if his innings seemed quite oedestrian compared with those of some of his colleagues, he was batting today in first-class company. Towards the end of his innings he was using his feet well and droving nicely, but h’s chief contribution was in the solid start he gave the innings and in his willingness to keep Reid at the Mwler’s end. Reid and Mooney scored 98 m a little more than an hour, but Reid went soon after, well held in the deep field. Then Sutcliffe and Poore batted so well that, temporarily Reid was forgotten. They were together for under an hour and yet scored 78 together with a suggestion of violence about their batting. Poore, indeed, took only 17 minutes to get off the mark and scored his 36 in only 40 minutes, quite his briskest batting of the tour. Poore has always looked accomplished, but has always been too slow to make the most of his comparatively long innings. Today, however, he took some calculated risks and benefited in runs and renutation. There were some typically handsome drives and strokes to mid-wicket, but from time to time there was a robust lofted shot to vacant parts of the field which required the ball to be hit across the line of .flight. Poore is so seldom guilty of these wholesome transgressions that he must have delighted in the success

of hk escapade. He could hardly have been more pleased than the spectators. Sutcliffe’s Success

Sutclifte batted an hour and a half for 63 artij it was a beautiful innings. Between lunch and tea New Zealand scored 168 \n two hours and Sutcliffe had his fulf\share of this success. Ho hit the ball \hrough the covers with indolent ease.x body curved over the ball, but swinging through effortlessly, and he placed for runs on the onside with absurdly easy deflections. He did not look as- aggressive and as bristling with inteflt as Reid had done, but he too scored al a most handsome rate. Later, there was. Leggat. whose square cut for four off Fuller was as good a shot as any, Mac Gibbon and Bell, scoring rapid runs at the end. If it was a day of batting above the ordinary, the bowlers and the Western Province captain, Nel. .also came through the day with considerable credit. The young off-spinner Delport bowled with admirable patience and a steady length and, if he had no answer to Reid and Sutcliffe, he kdpl trying and did not lose his length. The others were reduced by the pitch and the quality of the batting to perspiring impotence, but they too tried desperately hard. Nel did not take the new ball when it became available at 200 half an hour before tea. No doubt he realised the Ney Zealanders in the day’s last session would be extremely eager to score and’he kept using Delport till Sutcliffe, tryirg to hit a six, was well held by JVesttott on the long-on boundary. It was I tremendous hit, but was held back Dy the stiff breeze and it seemed’ to hang interminably before dropping almost straight down inside the boundary. . With Sutcliffe out Nel took the new ball, th< score then having advanced to 273 Sid the delay had been justified by pe results; With it Western claimed the wickets of Dempsterand Beck and checked others to an armlcciable extent. declaration was a useful one, for RHd took Commins's wicket