BIG FREE LIST.

Hokitika Guardian, 28 July 1925, Page 3

BIG FREE LIST.

7100 “DEADHEADS” AT LEA GEE AIATCH. AUCKLAND. July 20. To send a team of footballers to Sydney and then find that the free list at the opening match numbered over 7i)l.)0 —to he exact 7100—is not encouraging. and does not point io big profits being received at the conclusion of the tour. This is the experience of the New Zealand League, and it is not surprising that the New Zealand Council feels that the free list has been considerably overdone.

Important football matches will always attract big crow ds in Sydney, and. as the New Zealanders last season defeated the Englishmen in two of the three tests played in the Dominion, it was quite in order to expect a big crowd at the Sydney cricket ground when the New Zealanders met New South Wales a fortnight ago. A cable message giving details of the game mentioned the attendance at 23.000, but the New Zealand Council has since received advice front its financial manager at present with the team that the free list totalled <IOO. T’lm “gate” fell just a couple of hundred short of £2OOO, but this sum would have been considerably larger hut for the remarkable number of “deadheads,”

The New Zealand body expected a free list, of course, hut did not anticipate there would he 7100 on it. and was of opinion that, with the exception of the Cricket Ground members, who have their own stands on the ground, practically all who patronised the matches in which the New Zealanders took part would he tailed upon to pay. Apparently this is not to he. and it may he taken as certain that the Dominion’s share of the profits, il any, of the tour, will fall a long way below anticipations.