Cricket: Auckland in box seat for last day battle at park

By CHRIS RATTUE

Auckland are poised for an emphatic victory on the last day of their match against Canterbury at Eden Park today.

Canterbury face a tough battle on a pitch offering variable bounce.

Auckland yesterday added 28 runs to their overnight score of 244 for seven.

Reece Young was the first to go for 86. Young and Rob Nicol, who made 74 with great patience, added 153 for the eighth wicket and beat one of Auckland's oldest partnership records against Canterbury, that of Verdun Scott and Jim Blandford who scored 143 in the 1939-40 season.

Without Warren Wisneski in the attack through a pulled hamstring, Chris Martin, Stephen Cunis and Ryan Burson each snared three wickets for Canterbury.



Following on with a deficit of 178, Canterbury were still 129 runs in arrears at stumps, although with nine wickets in hand.



Canterbury found the portable wicket a problem. There were four lbw decisions and each came about through the low bounce.Apart from New Zealand under-19 player Shannon Stewart, who made 27, not one Canterbury batsman batted with any certainty.

Chris Drum was in the form that took him into the New Zealand side in Australia this season when he took five for 22 from 17 overs.

The key to the match today might be the leg spin of Brooke Walker whose four for 10 came from 14.5 overs.

* Some outstanding lemming impersonations from the Northern Districts batsmen have put Wellington in the hunt for what, at one stage, seemed an unlikely victory.

By stumps on the third day of the State Championship match in Hamilton, Wellington were 125 short of taking the outright points, with eight second innings wickets intact.

It has been a game mainly of batting disasters. The rain, which affected the first two days, certainly made it the weather for ducks. There have been 11 among the 32 wickets to fall.

Thanks to Michael Parlane's first innings 146, Northern had looked the more likely to emerge from the carnage to claim victory.

Wellington started the third day two runs short of the follow-on mark and with just two wickets remaining. While avoiding the follow-on, they were dismissed 102 runs short of Northern' first innings 227. Speedster Joe Yovich claimed five for 58 and Northern were in command at WestpacTrust Park.

Then entered the lemmings. For those not at the ground the scorecard suggested a pitch full of trouble.

Northern's second-innings collapse - they were dismissed for 139 in less than 60 overs - was due to demons not always associated with the lively pitch.

The Northern Districts top order, including star contributor James Marshall who hit 52, provided their own undoing. First-innings hero Parlane was beaten by a change-of-pace yorker from Mark Gillespie, Hamish Marshall and Grant Bradburn fell to leg-side swishes, and Robbie Hart was run out by a scrambling effort from Wellington captain Matthew Bell at mid-wicket.

James Marshall fell stretching to cut a wide delivery from Gillespie, who finished with five for 50.

But for another staunch effort from No 10 Bruce Martin, aided by Graeme Aldridge, Wellington would have had an even lower target than 242 to chase.

* Central Districts inflicted a crushing 425-run win over Otago at Molyneux Park in Alexandra yesterday.

Test batsman Mathew Sinclair, having reached his century before stumps on Wednesday, went on to 161 as Central pushed to 444 for eight declared, leaving Otago a target of 507.

They tumbled to be all out for 81. Only Chris Gaffeney, who got 37, made double figures.