McEwan battles injury

Press, 27 January 1988, Page 64

McEwan battles injury

Paul McEwan’s pleasure at scoring a century for Canterbury againt Auckland yesterday was blended with the pain experienced during his courageous innings. After contributing 118 runs towards Canterbury’s cause, McEwan confirmed that he had batted with the handicap of a cracked bone in his left hand from late on Monday afternoon. The injury was inflicted by the New Zealand fastmedium bowler, Danny Morrison, when McEwan’s total was about 56. He advanced to 62 by stumps and yesterday morning went on to his ninth firstclass century. It was his eighth threefigure innings for Canterbury, just one short of the provincial record held by Walter Hadlee. Graham Dowling also scored eight. Wearing his badge of courage somewhat shyly, McEwan’s only comment was "you didn’t see too many of my cover drives.” A graph of his innings would have shown that most runs were reaped from on-side shots. In all, McEwan batted 254 minutes and faced 198 deliveries, hitting 17 fours. He became the second batsman to exceed 4000 runs for Canterbury. With 4061 runs, McEwan trails only Barry Hadlee, whose provincial record is 4429.