THE SPORTSMAN'S LOG

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 891, 7 February 1930, Page 7

THE SPORTSMAN'S LOG

*et/CC* by

"ROUSEABOUT"

Are billiards and religion incompatibie? asks a writer in an EnglisH exchange. They may be, for the Mount Eden Borough Council evidently thinks that billiards and Sunday are incompatible. Sacrilege! An eminent English cleric considers that the holding of billiards matches in si Memorial Hall erected by Congregationalists half si century ago ••savours of sacrilege.” Members of the Mount Eden Fire Brigade consider that the council’s ban on billiards on Sunday at the fire station savours of “sacrifice.”

What a fine body of men the English cricketers now in our midst are, can be gauged from the following: When in Wellington the amateur members of the team were invited tc a function, and respectfully declined to go because their professional comrades had not been asked to go also. * * * Convention Goes Thus it seems that the ridiculous conventions of the past are being: discarded for ever. Time was when an amateur player would not walk in the same gate as a professional at Lords. » * * Fond of Pictures The long suit of the English cricketers in entertainment is the picture theatre. Some members spend all their available time there. A tale is told of the team when it was at a Southern town and scheduled to leave by train before the evening session began. The theatre manager put on a special screening in the morning, and the M.C.C. team turned up en masso to the afternoon session also! • m m An Australian writer says when Lindrum returns home, he will be greeted with prolonged “cue-ees.” jThia Persecution! Men must not display bare arms on VUe Rush cutters Bay (Sydney) tennis courts. Recently players in tho country week carnival appeared in athletic singlets. Tho next day a notice appeared on the result board, signed by C. Wedgwood, secretary of the ground, that regulation tennis drese must be worn on the courts. The mbarga does not apply to bare legs, however, as Wedgwood said that he saw nothing objectionable in girls playing without stockings.

PRAISE FOR MILLS ‘A VERY solid batsman, very . steady, and a fine man to open an innings/* was a remark made to THE SUN’S special respresentative, about J. E. M i lls’s batting in New Zealand’s first innings against the M.C.C. team in Wellington, by Hugh Trumble, the famous old Australian XI. player. Trumble * was greatly impressed by the Aucklander’s great f'rst innings effort.

When Man Laughs Touching on the enticing “bare leg” question again “Rouseabout” knows of one seaside holiday resort not many hours’ steam from Auckland, where Eve has gone back to stockings. The trouble is that the tennis court is situated in tho middle of a sandfly breeding ground. . . .! * * ♦ Record Profit The attendance at the final League Test between Australia and England was 18,378. The receipts totalled '£2,056, making the profits for the tour £2OO ahead of the record, which was just under £6,000 in 1921-22.

Popular Bowls Bowlers of Victoria are celebrating the jubilee of tho formation of the Victorian Bowling Association, which was born in 1880. Victoria has more than 13.000 players, and in tie Commonwealth of Australia there are probably 45.000 players. In Great Britain there aro more than 2.000.000 players in the amateur and professional class, and it is claimed that actually there are more Participants in tho ant ient pastime than any other British sport, not excluding football or cricket. Municipalities assist in the British Isles in popularising Drake's sport.

i In England recently, thanks to the ‘tote,” a woman won £351 with a bet of 2s each way. The horse that won was called Coole—and the woman collected. The bathing suit that makes a flapper look forward makes men look back. * * * R. T. Young, of Wellington, who is captain of lawn tennis at: Cambridge j University this year, is engaged to Miss j Beryn Roberts, of Kew, London. * * $ Cricket Hold-ups | "At this stage play was stopped while an annoying rubbish fire in an adjoining section was extinguished.” So runs a report of the Plunket Shield match in Dunedin this week. Seldom does a big cricket match pass without numerous hold-ups of this nature. Players are called upon frequently to chase gambolling dogs off the ground and rescue stray newspapers as they float over the wicket.

Familiar Sound The sound of the Mount Albert fire alarm is very familiar at Eden Park, and the sight of the brigade engine and its crowd of hangers-on careering along Edendale Road a frequent one. In fact it has been alleged that the calling out of the brigade is one of the best ways of breaking annoying batting partnerships. * * * Mr. H. Hose, father of Randolph Rose, one of the most popular runners New Zealand, has ever produced, is to act as manager of the Wellington team at the Dominion athletic championships to be held at Wanganui in March. a * * Cycling Unrest Cyclists and their association with the athletic centres of New Zealand is still a very much discussed subject in different parts of the Dominion, and so far no real solution of the trouble 1 has been found. The Wellington Centre has decided to go straight to the cyclists themselves and to ask them to state their opinions on the matter. The cyclists are being asked to sign a paper stating their opinion on the management of the sport, and no matter which way they vote, they will not be debarred from taking part in sports meetings controlled by the centre. It is hoped in this way to gain a representative opinion of the proposal that the cyclists shall run their own affairs. * * * Turned Down At the beginning of last football season the New Zealand Football Association sent a request home for a visit to the Dominion by an English team, but this week a letter was received from the International Selection Committee of the English Football Association, regretting that it was unable to accede to the request. There was also no indication in the letter as to whether the application would be favourably considered in the future, so that Soccer players of the Dominion may consider that they have been turned down hard. The International Committee, however, decided to send a team “to Germany to play one match, but the application for a return match was not entertained. It is also understood that a team .will be sent to Austria next: May to play a series of matches.

In Two Codes E. A. McLeod, a Wellington representative. in the New Zealand cricket team against the M.C.C. in tho second Test match at Wellington, is the first New Zealand hockey player to attain to international honours in two sports. In the winter, McLeod is a prominent hockey player, and last season he captained the New Zealand side in its matches against the touring Australian combination. McLeod is a very fine centre-half.