PLUNKET SHIELD TEAMS

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28472, 30 December 1957, Page 10

PLUNKET SHIELD TEAMS

No Interference By N.Z. Selectors (From Our Own Reporter) AUCKLAND, December 29. The New Zealand cricket selectors have no intention of asking any of the provincial selectors or selection committees to put particular players into their Plunket Shield teams, the convener of the. New Zealand committee (Mr H. G. Vivian) said in a special statement to “The Press” yesterday. my colleagues and myself Mr Vivian said, “is that the Plunket Shield competition commands so much interest in the provinces and victory in it is so highly esteemed that it would be most improper for us to attempt in any way to influence the selection of teams.

•tai in s P ite of th « Possibility that as a selection committee we conceivably might wish to see a player who had initerested us committed to a shield encounter, our attitude is that we can. only examine the shield series for what they are worth, and that we will have a chance, if we should require it, to call upon perhaps unused talent in the trial match to be played in February. It might even occur that this sort of talent would be called upon n the final match between New Zealand and the Rest. “The main point, however, is that we would not dream of trying to influence selections for shield matches.”

Mr Vivian and his colleagues, Mr H. B. Cave (Central Districts) and Mr L. P. Smith (Otago), will cover many miles during the shield series. Mr Vivian is “working” the North Island, Mr Smith the South, and Mr Cave, as a leading player of the Central Districts’ team, is, of course, viewing many possibilties from the field itself r