Northern Knights in safest place

BALL VERSUS BAT: Medium-fast bowler Daryl Mitchell sends down a delivery to Joe Carter in the Northern Knights trial game at Harry Barker Reserve yesterday. Play continued today in the three-day all-Northern Districts trial. Picture by Paul Rickard

It’s the safest place to be . . . if you want to play a three-day game of cricket on grass in late September.

Harry Barker Reserve and Poverty Bay Cricket have turned it on for the Northern Knights in what has become an all-Northern Districts trial, with the late withdrawal of Auckland from the fixture.

“Nowhere else in New Zealand at this time of year could you play on a grass wicket this good, and the ground itself is immaculate,” new Knights head coach and former Black Caps player and coach John Bracewell said.

“We came to Gisborne to get three days of match-play — in terms of the game, some of what we’ve seen was not unexpected.

“The trip is about a number of things, with batsmen establishing routines, bowlers getting their workloads up among them. It’s important that we’re able to do that.”

Day 1 scoring —NORTHERN DISTRICTS A 173 off 56.4 overs (Anish Desai 42, Joe Carter 34, Daniel Flynn 30, Sandeep Patel 24; Brett Hampton 3-27 off 10 overs, Jimmy Baker 3-33 off 7, Scott Kuggeleijn 2-29 off 14).

Northern XI 71-3 off 22 overs (Henry Cooper 32 not out, Daryl Mitchell 20no; Zak Gibson 2-20 off 6 overs, Henry Collier 1-14 off 4).