Personalities In N.Z. Sport

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 589, 15 February 1929, Page 13

Personalities In N.Z. Sport

A busy man to-day finalising arrangements for to-morrow's big championship athletic gathering, Mr. George Metcalfe, the newly-appointed secretary of the Auckland Centre of the New Zealand Amateur Athletic Association, has done much for the various branches of sport in Auckland. George by no means packs a career of sensational feats or records on the track or anywhere else, but for many years he has been a hard and silent worker for athletics, football and cricket. Although a fair handicap runner in his day, he did not enter the ranks of champions, but stuck to the game for the sport’s sake. For eieprtt years now he has been connected with the Auckland Amateur Athletic

— New Secretary of Athletic Centre is Keen Worker for All Sport ■i 1

Club, and has been throughout as popular an official as has ever favoured the club. For some time past now the control of the amateur sport has been far from that desired by fans and athletes, and it can well be expected that the new appointment of George Metcalfe to the secretaryship of the Auckland Centre will have a much desired effect. As chairman of the City Cricket and Rugby Club. George has become a prominent light in sporting circles, while he was one of the hard grafters in the reviving of this club. A pleasing personality, and with a good word for all, George Metcalfe is undoubtedly one of the most popular men connectecligfcvith sport in Auckland to-day.

CRICKET'S BIRTHPLACE—In playful retaliation against football encroaching on the cricket season by beginning in August. Mr. J. C. Squire, the well known English writer, organised a winter cricket match between his team of “Invalids'* against the “Hampshire Eskimos'* on Broadhalfpenny Down, Hambledon, Hants-, the famous pitch, where the first recorded cricket match took place in 1750. A matting wicket was used, while scoring was done from a closed motor-car owing to the bitterly cold weather. An interesting feature was the meet of the Hambledon Hunt on the down while the match was in proqress. The picture shows an “addition” to the famous memorial on Broadhalf penny Down, erected to commemorate the first cricket match. Mr. Harry Newlands (“Piccolo Ned**) poses on the top of the plinth.