FANTASTIC IDEAS FOR BRIGHTER CRICKET

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24715, 18 September 1941, Page 4

FANTASTIC IDEAS FOR BRIGHTER CRICKET

Fwill be only a week or two now until cricketers are looking out their gear and thinking about practice and teams for the new season. The cricket news of the week in Dunedin has been the unfortunate loss experienced by the Albion-Y.M.C.A. Club, The destruction of all its gear in the tragic fire at Logan Park is a . serious one, and the hope of everyone interested in the game is that the club will be able to carry on its full activities despite such a cruel stroke of fortune. , , The other main interest of officials and players from now until the start of the season will be in the system adopted to cope with the difficulty created by the loss of so manv players to the armed forces. Training .requirements may prove an effective obstacle to the satisfactory continuance of two-day cricket, and it is likely that there will be a genera, leaning toward one-day games. This problem of keeping clubs with as many teams in the field as possible is an exacting one. and it is bound up with the question of brighter cricket. And that is something of which Arthur Mailey has written often. In a recent article he discusses some fantastic suggestions made to this end. Whatever else might be said of the New South Wales Cricket Association, he savs, it must be admitted that it honestly desires to brighten cricket. The association has received some fantastic suggestions as to how it can be done. There seems to be a good deal of misunderstanding about the proposal to divide the batting time. Originally it was intended to play two-day grade matches and confine the batting time, on each Saturday to two equal periods. It was expected that the public would see the batsmen of both teams in action on the first Saturday and probably on the second. Now we find that the suggestion before the Grade Committee is that if St. George, for example, bat for _ their allotted two hours and lose six wickets, their remaining batsmen must take up the batting in the second innings on the second Saturday. In other words, the batting on the second Saturday may be confined to the tail-enders of both sides. , This is the most insane and unsatisfactory suggestion I have ever heard, Mailey goes on. Who wants to see tail-enders bat, anyway? If they were efficient batsmen they would not be tail-enders. If tail-enders were good bowlers they wouldn t want to bat I was a tail-ender all my cricket life' and felt as self-conscious as a scene-shifter who has been suddenly called upon to sing grand opera when I tarried for an over or so at the wickets. Whether tail-enders want o show off with the bat or not should not enter into the discussion.-

Bowling Prospects Following the recent opcll of mild weather, the bowling greens in the Dunedin Centre have made rapid progress and the majoritv of th ..n already bear a remarkably fine appearance The surface of the Caledonian at present is one that would gk.dden the heart of anv bowler and several others are not far behind. The Dunedin Club which experimented successfully a year aao in changing from grass to weed, has reason to congratulate itself, as the prospects for a fine surface in the coming season have seldom, if ever been brighter. The greens farther afield are also looking exceedingly well The weed has made steady progress on the Portobello green which this vear promises to be on a par with the best citv standard. Mr Spencer Bolt, of the Tainui Club, has accepted the oosition of greekeener at Portobello and he will also materially strengthen the club's claying strength Several clubs will hold their official openings on Saturday October 11. including Caledonian. Tainui. Caversham and Portobello. and several others will follow suit on the following Saturday pmon? them being Dunedin and Logan Park. Wliitcombes for Bowls-*