Second XI.—Junior A Grade.

The 1926-27 season was notable for its fine weather, the games being postponed on one Saturday only. The team did well, winning six games out of the nine played during the season, and it is to be hoped that in the forthcoming season we will do even better. Several interesting matches were played, the most outstanding of these being against Institute. Thorndon. Old Boys and Midland.

Institute batted first and made 79. In this game our fielding was good, several excellent catches being taken. We replied with 162 (Dormer 40), thus having a lead of 83 on the first innings. Institute fared better in their second strike, making 169. Dormer bowled well, taking 7 wickets for 33 runs. We were then left with 87 runs to get for a win, but we failed miserably, being all out for 39.

Against Thorndon our first innings realised 117, C. H. Arndt played right through the innings for 64 not out. Thorndon replied with 174, leav page 63 ing us 57 behind on the first innings. We commenced our second innings on the second Saturday and put on 268 runs for six wickets, Evans (86), Tripe (70 not out) and Cormack (43) being the chief scorers. Thorndon required 212 runs for a win. They did not have time to compile this score, but it seemed likely that they would play out time, until J. McDonald came to light in the last quarter of an hour of the day. He took six wickets for 16 runs, and we left the field winners by 81 runs.

Our match against Old Boys lost much of the interest usually attached to this game owing to the fact that the Christmas holidays intervened between the first and second Saturday. Old Boys put up the good score of 298, and we realised that we would have some difficulty in passing this total. However, we managed to win by 29 runs on the first innings, owing to the good batting performances put up by Childs (62), Cormack (57), Tripe (50), McDonald (48) and Hall (30).

Our match against Midland was notable for the excellent sixth wicket partnership of McDonald (13S) and Greig (111), and also for the good batting of McGavin, who made 74. We opened badly, having two wickets down for 15 runs, but McDonald and Greig became associated and carried the score from 147 to 392.

J. C. Greig, W. Hall and C. G. Frazer also batted four times for us having averages of 40.7, 88 and 32.3 respectively.

W.T. Veitmeyer Played two matches for us, taking 11 Wickets for 86 runs.

Generally speaking the fielding was not good. The ground fielding was only fair and too many catches were dropped. Childs, Hain and Hughes were consistently good in the field and saved many runs. Taking the team as a whole, the material was there, but several players did not show their true form. It is to be hoped that in the 1927-28 season last year's junior players will be fighting for places in the senior eleven.