$60,000 at stake for cricket series

Press, 2 December 1981, Page 48

$60,000 at stake for cricket series

Prizes worth more than 860,000 will be available to the players during the test and one-day international matches when the Australian cricket team tours New Zealand in February and March. Sponsorships from the Rothmans Foundation and Toyota New Zealand, announced last evening by the chairman of the New Zealand Cricket Council’s board of control (Mr R. A. Vance), will make the 1981-82 series by far the most lucrative in this country. The most glittering prize

will be the last to be awarded. After the completion of the third test at Christchurch the player judged to be “Man of the Series” will be able to drive away from Lancaster Park in a Toyota Corolla 1.6 Liftbac car, valued at about 814,000. A total of $50,000 from the Rothmans Foundation will by then have been won by team and individual performances in the tests and the three limited-over fixtures. In each of the one-day

games the successful side will receive 82800 and the loser $l2OO. The stake money in the tests is exactly double that amount, and there is a bonus of $4OOO for the team winning the test series. If matches are drawn, the prize money will jackpot to the next encounter; should no result be achieved in the final test or should the series be tied the two teams would share the appropriate booty. As well as the Toyota Corolla, the individual players will be vying for a total of $lO,OOO. The “Man of

the Match” in each of the limited-over games and tests is to receive $lOOO, and there are additional amounts of $2OOO for both the bowler with the best strike rate (balls per wicket) and the batsman with the top strike rate (runs per deliveries faced) in the one-day international series. The actual participants , will not be alone in benefitting from New Zealand’s sudden spurt into the increasingly professional world of cricket. Television viewers will have the chance of

entering a “classic-catch competition” for a five-door Toyota Starlet car worth almost $9700. Also announced last evening was the presentation by the Rothmans Foundation of an impressive gold cup which will be contested each summer by New Zealand and its visiting overseas opponent. The secretarv of the N.Z.C.C. (Mr G. T. Dowling) said yesterday that the awards were quite decisively the richest offered for a cricket series in this country

— “in comparision we played for fairly nominal prizes in the past.” “This is a natural follow on from what we saw on television from Australia last season, when our players were eligible to win substantial prize money,” Mr Dowling said. “That generated tremendous interest in New Zealand, not only among the public but also from sponsors. I am sure that the enthusiasm will be maintained when Australia makes its tour Jiere,” he said.