WELLINGTON LEADS

Evening Star, Issue 20993, 6 January 1932, Page 2

WELLINGTON LEADS

INTERESTING POSITION OF COMPETITION Each of the four teams in the Plunket Shield competition has now played two matches, and the / position is of considerable interest, with jvich depending on the result of the Welling-ton-Otago match, the date for which has yet to be fixed. A new points system was introduced into the Plunket Shield competition last season, and it has been the iffhans of effecting much brighter cricket. With conditions favourable over the recent holiday period some sensational cricket has been witnessed, and outstanding batting performances have been registered by R. 0. Blunt, M. L. Page, A, W. Roberts, H. G. Vivian, C. S. Dempster, and F. T. Badcock. Of these men all but Badcock (the Otago coach) and Roberts were members of the New Zealand team that toured England last season. Roberts certainly went close to selection, and. strangely enough, it was in the second innings of the match against Wellington last season that Roberts made 116.

Tlie century scorers in the shield matches this season have been as follow:

338 not out: R. C. Blunt, Otago v. Canterbury. 206: M. L. Page, Canterbury v. Wellington. 181: A. W. Roberts, Canterbury v. Wellington. 165; H. G. Vivian, Auckland v. Wellington.

154: C. S. Dempster, Wellington v. Canterbury. 105: F. T, Badcock, Otago v. Canterbury, Under the new points system a team scoring an outright win is credited with eight points. For a win on the first innings four points are credited, and a team that loses on the first innings scores two points. The position of the Plunket Shield competition to date is;—

Canterbury meets Auckland this week, and most interesting possibilities attach to this match and the Welling-ton-Otago game. The question has frequently been asked: “Has Otago any chance of winning the Plunket Shield?” Otago’s biggest hope would lie in Canterbury’s defeat by Auckland. Everything then would depend on the WcT-lington-Otago game, and if Otago were able to secure an outright win it would, under the results outlined, win the shield. If Wellington secures an outright win against Otago it will win the shield, irrespective of any other result; but if Otago should beat Wellington and Canterbury beat Auckland outright Canterbury would win the shield. If any teams should finish equal, which is scarcely possible as the points now stand, the competition is decided on the averages. The two games yet to be played are fraught with possibilities, with Wellington at the moment occupying the most favourable position.

•P pH C/5 rH 1/5 -P •p C co *& TS 0 bD IS 0 to 2 h w d.S *C . •p 0 *"3 d.S k° A ■§3 8 g O * ?.9 0-2 h3.S Cfi Wellington Canterbury 1 1 l — 1 12 10 Otago 1 — 1 — 8 Auckland — — 2 — —