Australia Bats Slowly But Loses Only Four

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30947, 31 December 1965, Page 3

Australia Bats Slowly But Loses Only Four

(N.Z. Press Association —Copyright)

MELBOURNE.

Australia, four wickets for 278 runs on the first day in the second test against M.C.G. look to the fifth-wicket batsmen, R. Cowper, 90 not out, and D. Walters, seven not out, to build heavily upon the score tomorrow.

The captain, R. Simpson, hopes to have his team bat for much of the day at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and to set England a very tough total in this five-day match. I n the early hours of play today it was rather grim cricket, rhe left-handed opener, W. Lawry, who reached 88, crawled to his first 50 in 200 minutes.

England’s weakened attack, notably the offspinner, D. Allen, did a highly creditable job of containment on a good pitch. The teams are: Australia: R. Simpson (captain), W. Lawry, R. Cowper, P. Burge, B. Booth, D. Walters, T. Veivers, P. Philpott, W. Grout, G. McKenzie. A. Connolly. England: M. Smith (captain), C. Cowdrey, D. Allen, R. Barber, K. Barrington, G. Boycott, J. Edrich, J. Jones. B. Knight, J. Parks, F. Titmus. To the great relief of the crowd of 33.987, bored by so much stodgy and uncertain batting, a splash of colour

was provided by Melbourne’s very own left-hander Cowper. Cowper, casting aside all his recent diffidence, played an innings marked by decisive and brilliant stroke play. Reached 90 The fair-haired Cowper got to 90 when 12 minutes’ play still remained. The crowd had cheered his every run but after that he was forced to “sit” on that score, losing too much of the strike to Walters while the English bowlers dawdled through the closing overs. Australia is in a sound position, but one far less favourable than was anticipated after Simpson had won !the toss and England had [been forced to go into this test without their No. 1 new

ball pair. D. Brown (injured) and K. Higgs (ill). The only batting failure was P. Burge, whose contribution of five runs followed his “duck” of the Brisbane test. But B. Booth’s 23 runs were not compiled in a confident manner either

The position would have been stronger had Booth been able to stay with Cowper till stumps. The Welsh left-hander, J. Jones, playing in his first test against Australia, standed Booth lbw 30 minutes before the close.

It was a damaging counterpunch by Jones, in his fourth over with the second new ball, after he had had 15 runs

(14 of them to Cowper) hit from his previous over. But England contributed to the slow rate of scoring by limiting overs to a fraction above 13 per hour.