Hawke Cup Cricket

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 312, 24 March 1928, Page 12

Hawke Cup Cricket

WANGANUI’S LOST LAURELS Great Post-War Record WAS PREMIER PROVINCIAL SIDE WITH the defeat of Wanganui in the Hawke Cnp match against Manawatu a few weeks ago, a remarkable chapter in the history of provincial cricket in New Zealand comes to a close.

QINCE the war, Wanganui had practically dominated the scene as the premier cricketing: province outside the main centres. On 22 occasions since 1919, Wanganui has played for the Cup and on 16 occasions has been victorious. With a, splendid cricket nursery to

draw on In Wanganui College and the Technical School, the riverside town for several years past had a backing' of half a dozen experienced players, any of whom would have been an acquisition to a metropolitan club. HOLLAND THE ALL-ROUND CHAMPION That great all-rounder, C. A. Holland, has represented New Zealand, and is still a big factor in Dominion cricket. Playing against Wanganui the other day, the Australians classed him as one of the best bowlers they had placed against on their tour of Maoriland. In the period under review, 1919 to 1928, Holland scored 829 runs for Wanganui at an average of 34.54 and took 117 Wickets at an average of 12.07. Once, against South Taranaki, he took all ten wickets in an innings. Holland virtually heads both batting and bowling for the series. CONSISTENT ORTON As a model of consistency with the bat, G. Orr was hard to beat. His highest score was 72, but for the whole series he averaged 30.03 for 32 innings. His aggregate of 931 runs is the highest for the series. R. W. Orton, on the other hand, registered a total of 656 at an average of 34.52 runs. He scored two separate centuries, 204 against Waikato and 138 against South Taranaki. A FINE BOWLING PAIR Outside Holland, A. Tronson, now resident in Auckland, but retired from the game, and E. H. Bernau, who went Home with the New Zealand team, were Wanganui’s best wicket-getters. With his wily slows, Tronson took 51 wickets at an average of 13.11 a wicket, and Bernau’s fast left-hand trundling brought him in 58 wickets at an average of 14.56 a wicket. On a wicket that suited him, Tronson was a terror to stay-at-home batsmen. Once he took six for nine against Nelson, and is the only Wanganui man in the series who ever managed to get three wickets with successive balls, his “hat trick” being accomplished against Hawke’s Bay. DEMPSTER’S OFF DAYS Dempster, the brilliant New Zealand eleven batsman, made two appearances with the bat for Wanganui in the Hawke Cup, but he was right out of luck, getting only three runs for two innings! Thakabou, who belongs to one of the reigning houses in Fiji, is a young Wanganui Technical College batsman, who batted six times for Wanganui in the Hawke Cup and scored 149 runs at an average of 29.8 runs an innings. Bernau could ply a vigorous bat as well as take wickets in the Hawke Cup, the genial and bespectacled lawyer being credited with a century against Taranaki, and a total of 447 runs at an average of 27.93 an innings.