Wellington Leads By 93 In First Innings

Northern Advocate, 13 January 1948, Page 6

Wellington Leads By 93 In First Innings

PLUNKET SHIELD

AUCKLAND, Tue. (Sp.).—Thanks largely to a brilliant innings of 152 by the 29-year-old Hutt Valley batsman, J. Kemp, and his two fine partnerships for the fifth and sixth wickets with E. Dempster and A. McLean, Wellington totalled 392 in its first innings against Auckland in the Plunket Shield match at Eden Park yesterday.

Wellington passed the home team’s score of 299 with only five wickets down and Kemp threw his wicket away shortly afterwards.

Facing a deficit of 93, Auckland scored 27 runs for the loss of one wicket in 35 minutes at the crease before stumps.

Auckland paid dearly for poor fielding, a fault that was apparent on its southern tour.

Kemp showed the value of a batsman using his feet, and his driving on either side was as good as anything seen at Eden Park for some time. USED HIS FEET Against the slow bowlers, he moved into the ball with the utmost confidence and hit it hard. He also picked up many runs with leg glances. (His partnership with Dempster was worth 101 runs in 93 minutes and took the sting out of the Auckland attack. The best partnership followed between Kemp and McLean. It yielding 128 runs in 126 minutes, of which McLean scored 35. Kemp reached his 50 in 91 minutes with five fours, his century in 184 minutes with eight fours and his 150 in 254 minutes.

He hit eight boundaries in his last 50, and altogether reached the fence 16 times. PROSPECT FOR ENGLAND

Kemp did not appear to relish a ball swinging away late but, after such a magnificent Plunket Shield debut, he should be well in the running for a place in the New Zealand side to tour England next year. McLean, who bowlfed so well in the early stages of Auckland’s first innings, proved himself a capable bat. He scored mostly behind the wicket in the early stages of his innings but later drove and square-cut strongly. He was last out, after being at the wicket for 230 minutes. He hit six fours. He and Murray put on 61 runs in 69 minutes for the seventh wicket. Wellington’s innings occupied 440 minutes. J jf.' AUCKLAND BOWLERS Playing in his first shield match, Hollywood secured the best bowling average—4 for 86. He was fairly steady but was inclined to be short of a length"on the leg side. Although Hayes had catches dropped j off his bowling, he did not impress as j a shield bowler. It was his first big 1 game, however, and he should develop. )