Seniors chasing hat-trick

Press, 3 October 1984, Page 39

Seniors chasing hat-trick

After winning the senior club cricket championship three times in the last five years Old Collegians is riding on a high and looking forward to another successful season.

The senior side, one of 10 teams the club is hoping to field this summer, will again be led by Richard Leggat who so far has enjoyed a 100 per cent record as captain. Two seasons and two championship pennants.

Old Collegians which began its existence in the 1924-25 season as a club for old boys of Christ’s College, became an open club in 1971, but.it was not until the 1979-80 season that the first senior title came. The best it had done previously was third. Club members will be taking a fair amount of interest in proceedings in Zimbabwe over the next three weeks with both Paul McEwan and Vaughan Brown in the New Zealand 1 touring, side there.

Not only is it the first time Old Collegians has had two players overseas in a touring team, but it is unusual for aqy club to be so well represented. The senior team will not, however, benefit much from McEwan’s dashing batting qualities this season. He has already been selected for the New Zealand side which will tour Pakistan after the Zimbabwe venture and he won’t be back in Christchurch until the last week before Christmas. And then McEwan will be called up by Canterbury for Shell cricket duties. And while Brown is batting and sending down his off-spinners in Zimbabwe he, too, will be pressing his claims for one of the three places still vacant in the team for Pakistan.

Last season the Old Collegians seniors were extraordinarily well off for good medium-pace bowlers with ;five, including McEwan, ithere to call upon. This summer the team won’t be

: quite so blessed with :McEwan away (though he

(was used only sparingly last season anyway) and Doug McMillan having transferred to Motueka. The club has also lost Paul Stuart, who accummulated 363 runs last season, to the new senior team, Marist. Some second grade players will be up for pro- ' motion.

Mr Blair Cartwright, the Old Collegians club captain, paid tribute to the coaching of the former Canterbury spin bowler, Peter Sharp, for the club’s recent successes.

While the club’s standard practice nights at Elmwood Park are Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, the senior side always has an outing on its own on Fri-

days when the practice is followed by a few beers and considerable analysis. Mr Sharp’s team talks were very valuable in getting the side mentally prepared for playing on the Saturday. The club is well off for practice facilities with two concrete pitches available as well as the grass ones. “When it’s wet we can carry on,” said Mr Cartwright. This season Mr Sharp is no longer the club coach because of his involvement in the new Canterbury junior cricket venture, but he will still be acting as “adviser” for the Old Collegians senior team.

Old Collegians is now well settled in at its pavilion, now two seasons old, and this year there should be some complimentary remarks about the snappy casual outfits the senior players will be sporting. The Northlands shop of Canterbury has provided the seniors with 15 sets of clothes for casual dress — a jacket, long pants, a pair of shorts, and a striped sports shirt. , Mr Cartwright said the club is always on the lookout for morning grade cricketers — second and third grade — and would welcome the arrival of any promising young cricketers leaving school this year. Last season the senior

championship was the only title Old Collegians won, though the fifth grade side was highly placed, but the club has achieved 17 successes in lower grades dur-' ing its history. It has won second grade contests three times, the fifth grade five times, seventh grade three times,

eighth grade on five occasions and the President’s grade once. The club has also won the Hadlee Trophy — based on punctuality, sportsmanship, and dress — ‘on three occasions.