RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31319, 15 March 1967, Page 28

RANDOM REMINDER

SHIVER MY TIMBERS!

It is, perhaps, a little late to inquire into the quality of equipment to be used in the cricket match between the touring Australian team and New Zealand, for the game begins at Lancaster Park tomorrow morning. But there may be some speculation about the prospects of the Forest Service stopping the match and arresting all the players. Not long ago, a cricket slump bought in a Christchurch shop disintegrated the first time it was struck by a straight delivery. Out of it came a longhorn beetle grub, which had eaten almost everything except the varnish. One

would hesitate to suggest that the New Zealand cricket administrators have arranged for the Australians to take to the crease bats in which l.b.g.’s lurk with criminal intent; the Australians are far too astute to be deceived in such a fashion and, in fact, probably spent most of last night checking their bats with stethoscopes. It may be unkind, at this stage, to trace a common fault in New Zealand batsmen and the Pakistanmade stumps which have the Forest Service timber inspectors eyeing the game with suspicion. The storebought stump disinte-

grated the first time it had to take a straight ball. . . . It is to be hoped that the Forest Service has no further cause to Include cricket among likely sources oi pest infiltration. It would be embarrassing if the cricket council had to submit all bats and stumps and balls for inspection, the Australians were asked to turn down the cuffs of their trousers, have their mail censored, and sign declarations that to the best of their knowledge they have no longhorn beetle grubs in their possession. There’ll be enough trouble with them, merely in trying to get them out.