Indoor cricket appeals to all

Press, 25 July 1984, Page 33

Indoor cricket appeals to all

Out with the armchair cricketer and in with the indoor cricketer — now anyone who knows which end of a cricket bat to hold (and instruction on that can be given) has a sport they can play and enjoy. Cricket has been reduced to its bare essentials and moved indoors to provide one and a half hours of nonstop fun for everyone. In this version of the sport, coloured clothing is the norm and protective gear the exception. And a team loses five runs for unnecessary rough play and bad language.

It is perhaps not surprising to discover that indoor cricket first gained promin-

ence in the land of underarm bowling, and although 50,000 people play the sport in Australia it appears to be tailormade for this country. With the great outdoors beckoning, weather conditions still make the great indoors attractive and even cost competitive. Involving team-work, exercise and fun, indoor cricket has got to be good, according to the organisers of the. Howzat complex. Already “a night with the boys” or a “night with the girls” is being spent not at the local hotel but at the local indoor cricket arena.

The Howzat complex was built to cement indoor cricket’s appeal. With that

in mind, it was fitted with top-grade facilities. It has an electronic scoreboard, a public address system for the umpires, four present senior cricket players employed to umpire, and a totally synthetic floor covering that can be used for hard-ball practices. For the spectators, there are refreshments available and a mezzanine floor for a ■good view of proceedings. Everything down to the decor was chosen to make the atmosphere pleasant. Housewives leagues, shiftworkers’, business house leagues and mixed leagues have all been planned at the Howzat arena, which is situated at 908 Colombo Street.

Brian McLean drives the ball strongly to get runs for “Bob Kyle’s Eight” against a team from the solicitor’s firm of Weston Ward and Lascelles.

In the umpire’s box behind the batsman, the New Zealand cricket representative and Howzafs manager, Paul McEwan, adjusts the electronic scoreboard. The indoor cricket arena consists of two 10m wide “courts” enclosed in highgrade netting. The umpires, who have all played senior grade cricket, are linked to a public address system to avoid confusion with decisions. The complex has also been fitted with high-tech-nology lighting that will enable television cameras to film inside.