The Cricket Field

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 100, 24 October 1936, Page 23

The Cricket Field

(By "Not Out.")' VEXED QUESTION OF STATUS

EX-CHAIRMAN FAVOURS PRESENT SYSTEM

It .would appear that there is not likely to be any shelving of the question of promotion and relegation, which has been causing quite a stir of late in Wellington Cricket Association circles. Mr. A. M. Hollings set out-in these columns last week a scheme which he intends to have pvesented to delegates before another season is commenced, and at this week's meeting of the association's management committee Mr. W. A. Baker indicated that he proposed to move later in the present season for a sub-committee to be set up to bring down proposals. Now Mr. P. B. Broad, who has just retired from the office of chairman of the management committee after long service, sets out the position as he sees it and he clangs that f£ir and impartial consideration by the management committee is much to be preferred to the system of automatic promotion and relegation advocated by Mr. Hollings.

Mr. Broa,d writes:—"Let me say, in the* first, place, that I appreciate the ; care and thought Mr. Hollings has , giyen to the preparation of the schema which-he has brought forward for automatic promotion and relegation. His ' proposals are certainly an ad- , vance on' any others that toave been made (and in the past they have been numerous) for regulating admission to senior rank, and I would even go so far as to say that, if ever a scheme . of automatic promotion and relegation should have to be adopted, then we could'not do better than adopt Mr. Hollings's. "WHY UNFAIR?" "I. join issue, however, with Mr Hollings on a number of points, and at the vory outset I' differ from him in his statement that it is wrong for the question of promotion to be settled merely by the opinion of those individuals who happen to compose the management committee. Mr. Hollings says that it is manifestly unfair to the , management committee to throw, the whole onus of such a decision on to its shoulders, especially when a definite rule can avoid all unpleasantness. But why is it unfair to do so? "The management committee i« ' elected for the express purpose of governing the administration of cricket in" Wellington city. As a matter'of fact. I think it will; be found, that the management committep usually represents, at "any rate, 80 per cent, of the voting strength of delegates. How can cricket,be.better governed than by those whom the delegates representing all, clubs have decided to place in charge of the ■ game?-It will be seen that the main ' point ~.upj to this stage upon which ■: I differ from'Mr.'Hollings is on the ques-

tidn of the soundness of having a written rule as opposed to an unwritten anid flexible guide. .

Constitution .of the U.S.A. is a"',written one, but I have never yet heard anybody seriously argue that it could compare in the matter of-.prac-tical operation with the unwritten Constitution of the United Kingdom. If any question that comes before the 'management committee is to be decided by rule of thumb, why should not all questions be so decided, all room / for personal opinion shut out from consideration, and the decision of' the various questions that come before the management committee be serried by the secretary, by reference toivqlume (x) rule (y) of the rules of the association?

"Moreover, is Mr. Hollings going to apply, as I think he should if he.' is to be logical, his rule to cricket throughout New Zealand? To bring the matter a little further home, is automatic promotion and relegation to be adopted as major and minor associations? The result of applying such a rule would, be that the Canterbury Cricket Association would drop out and the Manawatu Cricket Association would take its place. The analogy is a fair and just one and precisely in point. It illustrates immediately the .real weakness of any automatic system of promotion and relegation. PLATING BELOW GRADE. "I have made in .general terms two criticisms of Mr. Hollings's proposal?. I will now mention a third, which appears to me to be in point of fact a complete and final answer to the question as to whether any scheme of automatic promotion should be adopted. Apply Mr. Hollings's proposals in point of fact to Wellington as a result of last year's competitions. University would become a second grade team and Institute would take its place.

"Among the University team to come down (and bear in mind that, Mr. Hollings strongly urges that the management committee should have no power to classify players) would be Tricklebank and Blandford, one of the best bowlers and the best wicketkeeper in New Zealand. Under these conditions, the; second grade competition would become a joke, but whether it did or not, the point is that two outstanding players would not for nine-tenths of the season be playing in the class of cricket where they should play. Experience, moreover, shows that in such a case as this the good player invariably levels down to the class in which he-is playing. One has only to point to the: classic instance of Macartney

and his performances when in Dunedin as a coach some years ago. "If the consideration that I have been discussing is applied to a number of the existing senior teams, it will, I think, be found that the criticism holds good to such a great extent as to render it certain that if Mr. Hollings's scheme were adopted, immense harm would be done, at least in one direction, and it seems to me that, unless he can point to some 'overpowering benefit arising out. of the adoption of his scheme, or can answer the objection that I have raised, then his scheme must stand condemned. 'present system favoured. "I turn now from the consideration of the proposal, for automatic promotion and relegation to advocate the retention of the present system, .under which the management committee becomes the sole arbiter of the question. ' "Assuming that a fair and impartial management committee can always be elected under the present system, and I think that. always is the. position, then I do; not see.how any scheme based on rule as opposed to opinion can- be brought forward that would not have the defects in it that history and experience have shown are possessed by all those bodies or institutions that are based upon and governed iby an entirely 1 written constitution. It is perhaps worth while noting in passing tha,t Mr. Hollings cannot point, I think I am correct in saying, to any sports body, throughout* the world in which a system of automatic promotion and relegation is successfully 'operated now, and in saying this I am not overlooking the fact that such a system exists in Rugby football in

Wellington, but a few moments' consideration will convince anyone that the conditions which apply in Rugby football are totally different from the conditions that affect cricket. ,'■ WHY KARORI CAME UP. "I can reduce to five ttie main reasons that actuated the'management committee in admitting Karori to senior status a year ago: These are:— "(1) Strength of the club. At that time the Karori Club had six or seven teams and had occupied for several years a high position in the club championship. "(2) Strength of the first eleven. The Karori eleven had for several years occupied a leading position in the second grade championship. "(3) Has the club promoted a backing? That is tc say, is it based on some institution or district,of such a character as to give the club .the feature of permanency? This is an important matter. In the case of the Karori Club, it was found that the club represented a district which was destined to be in the course of years one of the largest residential districts in Wellington, and it had a wide appeal and support in that district. "(4) Finance. Is the club to be promoted financially strong? Obviously, it is not in the interests of the association to admit to vsenior status a club that might fail to meet its obligations, or might after a year or two fail through lack of financial support. In the case of the Karori Club, it was shown that not only was the club, the strongest financial club -in the whole of Wellington, but it was probably in a better position financially than even some of the associations affiliated to the New Zealand Cricket Council. "(5) Also an important factor to bear in mind is, whether the club under consideration for promotion has its own ground available. SHOULD NOT BE DIFFICULT. "Other' considerations may suggest themselves to the management committee from time to time, but it seems to me that if the five factors I have mentioned be carefully ' applied and considered by the management committee, whenever an application in the future comes forward from some club to be promoted, then the management committee will have little difficulty in deciding fairly and impartially whether a claim to be promoted has been properly made out, and will also have no difficulty in deciding by applying the same five tests which of the existing senior clubs is to be relegated to

make room for the new arrival in senior cricket. "In the near future the Petone Club will obviously apply to be readmitted to senior status. In the more remote future the same application will be made by the Technical Old Boys' Club, and in the more distant future still a like application will come forward from Onslow. I cannot conceive how the claims of any one of these three teams, when they come forward, can be better considered and more fairly adjudicated upon, with less disturbance to cricket in Wellington, than by consideration at the hands of the management committee, bearing -in mind the five factors I have mentioned."