LARGE CRICKET CROWD AT WANGANUI

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 42, 20 February 1939, Page 6

LARGE CRICKET CROWD AT WANGANUI

TAKINGS NEARLY £lOO ENGLISH VISITORS PLEASED WITH WICKET The attendance of the public during the cricket match on Saturday at Wanganui in which Sir Julien Canns team participated, is believed to be a record. The takings were £97 odd. This is considered very satisfactory by the Wanganui Cricket Association, as it emphasised a very much improved public interest in the game since the last English side piayed here in 1936.

The attendance of 2000 justified the New Zealand Cricket Council in allotting a match to Wanganui, and the attendance is likely to nave a strong influence in favour of Wanganui s claim to a match with the next Australian team to come to the Dominion.

The Englishmen were greatly impressed with the wicket on Cook * Gardens. Mr. A. H. Dyson, the Glamorgan batsman, said that it was one of tiie best wickets he had played on. Interviewed after the maten, the sole selector of the Wanganui cricket team, Mr. E. C. Gee, said that the home side, considering everything, played well. “It was a team of young players,” he said, “and they were up against a stiff proposition. The stand made by H. Cumiug and L. Connor at a critical period In Wanganui’s innings was a good one.”

"1 think the English side will prove to be better than anything we can produce in New Zealand and as gooci as anything from Australia,” said Mr. F. W. Gilligan, one of the umpires. "It is a good, all-round side. While some of the Wanganui batting at the start was weak, I think much of that was due to nervousness and in not playing out to the fast bowling.’

Several of the English players paid a high tribute to the batting ot L. Connor, who was Wanganui's only representative in the Country team in this year's Wellington Town versus Country match.

ENGLISH CRICKETERS

BRIEF STAY IN WANGANUI SIR JULIEN CAHN’S GESTURE. Although the stay in Wanganui of the English cricket team sponsored by Sir Julien Cahn was necessarily brief, it was a happy one. Sir Julien said that although his object was primarily to encourage the game of cricket, he was also anxious that the players in the team should get to know New Zealand conditions. Billeting them with people in various centres aided that object. They were able to mix a great deal more freely with the people in the country they were visiting than if they stayed together as a team. The players were entertained at the Commercial Club after the match and they all had an opportunity yesterday morning of seeing something of the city and its surroundings. They left in the afternoon at 2 o'clock for Palmerston North, where they will play against Manawatu to-day. The consensus of opinion in Wanganui after the match was that Sir Julien Cahn's gesture in sponsoring the team was indeed a generous one. Old cricketers predict that the game will receive a great fillip from the visit.