FROM 23 FOR FIVE, TO 271 FOR EIGHT Gallop Century-Maker In Great Fight-Back

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30945, 29 December 1965, Page 13

FROM 23 FOR FIVE, TO 271 FOR EIGHT Gallop Century-Maker In Great Fight-Back

(By R. T. Brittenden) No tinkering with the laws, no croaking critics can destroy cricket’s charm.

At Lancaster Park yesterday Canterbury, after losing five for 23, went on to make 271 for eight wickets, and the spell of the game kept out the cold winds and showers which preceded the warm sunshine of late afternoon.

When the curtain was drawn for the day, D. L. Gallop had made an unbeaten century with an innings of. rare resolution; there had been two magnificent partnerships, with K. Thomson and J. M. Mclntyre; and there had also been some superbly skilful fast left-arm bowling from R. E. Sutton.

This was a magnificent recovery by Canterbury and a memorable innings by Gallop, whose century was his first in repsesentative cricket.

As it stands now, Auckland still has a slight edge: Canterbury needs 51 runs, w' i two wickets in hand, to take first innings points, and today has the hurdle of making a new start against fresh bowlers.

The wonder of it was that Canterbury did not have the indignity of a follow-on thrust on it, for after the first hour yesterday kucklaiid seemed irresistible. Century Stands Thomson and Gallop scored 120 for the sixth wicket. Gallop and Mclntyre have so far added 100 for the ninth. The scoring rate of 2.5 runs an over was well below Auckland’s 3, but the ntns had to be won from the shambles of the early batting. All three of the principals in Canterbury’s carefully-nur-tured counter-attack came from the Sydenham club, a point which did not escape the many small boys in the crowd who follow the fortunes of the club with particular enthusiasm.

Gallop is their especial hero, but he is not their monopoly. There is a much wider and very appreciative audience for the spirited performances Gallop so often produces. It was disciplined batting of a very high order which won Gallop such distinction.

He is, by cricketing nature, pugnacious and assertive, and his first impulse when his side is in trouble is to go in and hit the bowling hip and thigh. His self-control yesterday, his sustanied concentration—he has already been in nearly five hours and a quarter—were admirable.

Thomson, who usually reacts in similar fashion, also restrained himself wonderfully well and played a fine innings in reaching 50. After that, nature rather took its course and he looked much more likely to get himself out.

But admiration of Canterbury’s batting recovery might tend to obscure the quality if Auckland’s early bowling—and that would be wholly unfair. The pace and life and swing of Sutton were the topics of lunch-time conservation.

At one stage this slender but athletic left-hander had taken three for 4 from his first six overs. Canterbury was set a considerable task in trying to reach Auckland’s 321 with a set of out-of-form batsmen, and it seemed an impossible job when Sutton discovered a pitch which underlined the sharp thrust of his bowling Dangerous Lift His line of flight is awkward for right-handed batsmen: he can swing the ball, he can keep it pretty well where he wants it, and from a length he was able to make it lift dangerously. It was a fine piece of newball bowling which had Canterbury almost on its knees, and the demolition was assisted by a couple of extraordinarily weak strokes which lost Canterbury wickets, and by safe Auckland catching. Gallop and Thomson had to battle their way through a tense and trying period, with the light in the hour before lunch as gloomy as Canterbury’s prospects. The recovery sprang from resolution, well-ordered batting, a sharp decline in the pitch activity, the loss of Sutton, with an attack of cramp, before the second new ball was available, and a couple of missed chances. And it all added up to a second day of fascinating cricket, with an appealing situation this morning. Ryan Unlucky There must have been much sympathy for M. L. Ryan, whose dismissal started Canterbury’s swift decline. He was in his first shield match, and the fifth ball he faced was one of the two or three which defied orthodox defence by whipping through appallingly low. B. F. Hastings flicked at a ball which rose sharply, I. R. Hartland was well held after Sutton had moved one off the pitch, and B. G. Hadlee was guilty of following one from R. S. Cunis which left him.

B. R. Taylor played a couple of good-looking shots, but then waved his bat around a straight one, much in the manner of a drum major with his baton.

So in little more than an hour, half the side was out for 23, and the innings hung by a very slender thread. Thomson and Gallop reinforced it by attention to basic principles, and courage. By lunch, they had taken the score to 73, about eight minutes’ play being lost through rain, and they had overcome the initial shocks.

Confidence Grew

With the shine off the ball, Sutton and Cunis were of lesser stature, and both batsmen, in this period, made some good, strong off-side shots, Thomson once or twice revealing a square cut of vast power, made with unhurried ease.

The batsmen’s growing confidence could be heard in their sure calling for quick singles after lunch, and they ran supremely well. Thom-

son may still, with his extraordinary crouch, look among the most inelegant of batsmen, but he is a fine player while he can thrust aside memories of his early Canterbury days, when he and everyone else expected the runs to come at reckless speed. He played straight and firmly, he took no risks, but he looked for runs.

Gallop was rather in Thomson’s shadow for a , c<>ns ’"®r able period, but they both blossomed forth when J. 1Sparling bowled himself at one end, the slow \eft-hander H. J. Howarth at the other. Howarth’s rather fulsome flight must have tempted the batsmen to have a fling, after the rigours of resurrection against the pace. But they attacked the slow bowlers in a logical fashion too, a few booming hits, now and again, opening up the field and making possible the firmly-driven singles. Got Himself Out So they went on, and it was a fascinating strugle, until Thomson reached 50 in 143 minutes. Then his concentration declined quite sharply. He began to take quite undue risks, and at 68, he got himself out It was a pity he could no longer see which way duty lay, but it would be less than fair to remember that and not the firm courage of most of his innings, and the fine strokes with which he expressed it. Thomson’s departure ended a list of innings which looked more like a telephone number than a Canterbury score-sheet, but R. C. Motz was back in the pavilion almost before Thomson had his pads off. He made a most unwise attempt to hit a ball far too wide of him for the stroke, and was easily caught; and so it seemed that all the efforts of Thomson and Gallop were to go for naught. Past Half-Century But Mclntyre has shown, since he came to Christchurch, that he can bat as well as bowl, and soon he was recalling that he once made a half-century for Auckland against Wellington. Not always fully sure of himself against the lifting ball, he nevertheless defended with a fine singleness of purpose and after picking up runs with quite elegant glances, later asserted himself more often.

Gallop and Thomson had scored their 120 in 152 minutes and after Motz was out, G. A. Bartlett helped Gallop score all but one of the 24 runs needed to avert the possibility of a follow-bn. Soon after tea Mclntyre joined Gallop in a stand which has so far lasted 114 minutes and produced 100 runs. Gallop was given a testing time by the Auckland fast bowlers, who dropped the bail short and made it fly quite regularly. Once Gallop scored a 4 from one of the bouncers with an airy overhead wave of the bat, but they were distinctly unsettling and he did extremely well to make-such measured progress. Two Escapes But in the 90’s he had a bad patch, twice in an over mishitting Cunis in the air; from the second one, R. W. Morgan might have made a fine running catch had the wicket-keeper, R. Harford, left the task to him. And when Gallop was 92 Harford dropped him off Cunis. But from that point Gallop restored order to his batting and a strong on-drive brought him to his century in 295 minutes. With Sutton off the field. J. D. Behrent shared the new ball, at 227, with Cunis but the batsmen went on steadily to stumps. It was a great day for Gallop, who had previously scored five half-centuries in shield cricket. No success could have been more deserved, or more popular. It was a pity for Auckland that one more spell could not have been wrung out of Sutton, who made a very good impression indeed. Cunis, although wasteful of the new ball early, was full of purpose and persistence. Behrent was a little disappointing, but Sparling, whose appearance in this match gives him more Plunket Shield matches than any other Auckland player, bowled tidily and usefully, often inviting the drive and then denying it with his flight. There was not much turn for him, or for Morgan. Howarth bowled better than on his previous appearance at Lancaster Park, but was no great danger. The gate takings for the first two days of the match have totalled £629.