Players9 Fitness Worrying Cricket Selectors

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31915, 17 February 1969, Page 20

Players 9 Fitness Worrying Cricket Selectors

“The Press” Special Service NEW PLYMOUTH. Concern that not all the New Zealand cricket test candidates were as match-fit as he would like was expressed by Mr M. E. Chapple, chairman of the national selection panel, on Saturday.

“All the test candidates have been passed as medically-fit,” he said. “But there is a difference between being medically-fit and match-fit.” Otherwise, Mr Chapple said, he was most pleased with New Zealand’s state of preparedness for the West Indies tour.

He made these comments after the inter-island match at Pukekura Park had ended in a draw, with most of the honours going to the South. Forced to follow on 255 runs behind, the North was 176 for three at the close. “One of the good things is

that our batsmen have been scoring more runs and batting longer,” Mr Chapple said. “This is a good sign for it shows that they are prepared to concentrate harder.

“The double-century of Bruce Murray early in the Plunket Shield season made the rest of the batsmen realise that even single centuries might not be enough. “We are in the position where chaps who have scored centuries will not be in the test team, and this has not always happened in the past.” HARDER THAN INDIANS

While he thought New Zealand was prepared for a home test series, Mr Chapple said itwould be foolish to under-

rate the West Indians because successful in Australia.

they had not been altogether “I would think that the West Indies will be a harder proposition than the Indians last season."

Commenting on the NorthSouth fixture, Mr Chapple said he hoped that this would be played each year. “We need this kind of match as an intermediate stage between shield and international cricket. This match has been most valuable.”

After a most promising start, which had B. R. Taylor taking the last two North Island first innings wickets in four balls and then G. D. Alabaster spinning bis way through the top of the North second innings, South could not press home victory on Saturday. DELAYED BY RAIN

Almost half the day’s play was lost to rain, which grudgingly permitted a start at 2.15 p.m. but left one crease so wet that R. C. Motz would have risked life and limb if he had tried to bowl there at his top speed. North’s first innings ended swiftly at 206. 255 behind the South score, and when, in the follow on. Alabaster had North three for 69 with 105 minutes remaining, it seemed likely that South would score a crushing win on the wearing pitch. However, R. W. Morgan (66 not out) and M. J. Shrimpton (43 not out) met this crisis nobly. They had an unbroken stand of 107 in 105 minutes for the fourth wicket and carefully steered North to a face-saving draw. CONFIDENT OPENERS Earlier, M. L. Ryan was much sounder than in the first innings, B. A. G. Murray looked typically confident, and Motz, after trying to bowl round the wicket where the foothold was firm, eventually dropped his run when bowling over the wicket. Neither effort was satisfactory and he did not have the chaiice to bowl well.

So, as in the first innings, the score moved smartly into the 50s—and then came Alabaster with his accurate and awkward off-spin. Ryan tried an on-drive which lofted neatly into K. Thomson’s hands at mid-wicket and five runs later Murray, usually a peaceable man, looked piercingly at the umpire, Mr C. Hunt, when he was given out leg-before on the front pad as he reached down the pitch to sweep at Alabaster. M. G. Burgess had time only to take his season’s tally from 215 to 220—small pickings in these days of high scoring—before he prodded and expired in Alabaster’s leg trap. In short time, North had slumped to 69 for three, and when J. M. Mclntyre began to make the ball turir and nip up. North was in peril. Shrimpton threw up massive defences against this bowling, but Morgan had other ideas. He went up the pitch and drove at Alabaster; he went back and cut at McIntyre. It was safe, sensible batsmanship and it was also ' successful. i SIEGE WAS LIFTED Alabaster, who at one stage . had three for 21, lost some of bis control and the ball . seemed drawn as if my magnetic force into the middle of ' Morgan’s broad bat. Heart- , ened by this, Shrimpton twice moved out and on-drove Alabaster for fours in one over, , sumptuous strokes which helped lift the siege.

Back came Motz, but Morgan was not tempted, as he had been in the first innings, by Motz’s out-swing. Morgan had seven fours in his 50, they reached 100 together in 101 minutes, and during the last 30 minutes, which included some low-pressure bowling from Thomson and G. M. Turner, they scored very much as they pleased. Apart from giving the South Island the chance to put the North Island very much in its place, the match should have solved some test problems. It confirmed Motz and Taylor as bowlers of test class, and it put .Cunis and Collinge in almost the same grade. B. W. Yuile may well have retained his lead over Howarth and Mclntyre in the slow left-armers* ballot and B. D. Milburn, who kept wicket rather more tidily than did S. R. Speed, may have cut back Speed's apparent favouritism for the first test.

SOUTH ISLAND First Innings (for 9 dec.) .. 461 NORTH ISLAND First Innings B. -A. G. Murray b Motz .. 33 M. L. Ryan lbw b Taylor .. 22 R. W. Morgan c Taylor b Motz 4 M. G. Burgess c Turner b Motz 5 M. J. F. Shrimpton c Motz b Alabaster .. 28 V. Pollard b Melntyre .. 11 B. W. Yulle run out 44 S. R. Speed c Motz b Alabaster 17 R. O. Collinge not out .. 30 R. S. Cunis b Taylor 1 H. J. Howarth b Taylor .. 0 Extras (byes 5, leg-byes 5, no-ball 1) .11 Total 206 Fall of wickets: one for 58, two for 60, three for 68, four for 69, five for 93, six for 123, seven for 162, eight for 183, nine for 206. Bowling.—R. C. Motz, 12, 5, 31, 3; B. R. Taylor, 9.4, 1, 32, 3; G. D. Alabaster, 23, 5, 60, 2; J. M. Mclntyre, 15. 6. 32, 1; J. W. Burtt, 7, 0. 40, 0. Second Innings Murray lbw b Alabaster .. 25 Ryan c Thomson b Alabaster 24 Morgan not out .66 Burgess c Dowling b Alabaster 8 Shrimpton not out .. 43 Extras (byes 8, no-balls 2) 10 Total (for 4 wkts) ..176 Fall of wickets: One for 54, two for 59, three for 69. Bowling.—Taylor, 6,2, 30, 0; Motz, 5,0, 20, 0; Alabaster. 15. 4, 55, 3; Mclntyre, 13. 7, 18, 0; Burtt, 5,0, 25, 0: G. M. Turner, 3,1, 8,0; K. Thomson, 2,0, 10, 0.

Homeward Bound.—Two Government members of the New Zealand Parliament, Messrs G. F. Gair (North Shore) and E. S. F. Holland (Fendalton), left for New Zealand tonight at the end of a six-week fact-finding tour of Britain, Europe and SouthEast Asia.—Singapore, Feb. 16.