Cricket: Bumpy fields delay start to season

Kensington Park was pretty quiet on Saturday after the first weekend of cricket was cancelled for player safety. Photo / Michael Cunningham

Cricket in Northland got off to a false start as player safety took priority with all games cancelled before they got kitted up.

This weekend was supposed to signal the early start of the cricket season, kicking off with the Dargaville Shield and the Greg Guy Shield, as the Northland Cricket Association looked to prepare their flagship team ahead of their opening match on November 1.

Northland Cricket competitions manager Neal Parlane said the decision, made late on Friday afternoon, was a common sense one.

"With rugby and soccer and the other winter codes rolling on a bit longer this year, Kensington Park and others haven't been renovated as good as they should," he told the Advocate, adding that Maungakaramea's ground was soft underfoot as well.

"We had a look on Friday afternoon and the ground was a bit bumpy, we didn't want anyone getting injured - especially any Northland players.

"We decided to use a bit of common sense and said 'let's just can it and ease into it next week'."

While disappointed to not get the season under way as planned, Parlane felt it was not worth pushing on just for the sake of it.

"It's just not worth it [forcing the games to go ahead]. It turned out the day [on Saturday] wasn't a flash one for playing cricket anyway. We've got another 25 weeks of cricket so let's not play because we have to. We'll just ease into it next week."

The much anticipated return of the Dargaville and Greg Guy Shields to the cricketing calendar for the first time in many yearsmeant the first weekend of the season was met with some excitement.

Northland Cricket Association general manager Warren Marr was glad to see the return of the sub-union competitions, saying it should build a more competitive start to the year and in turn help preparations for the Northland men's team.

"The start of last season was pretty uninspiring, to be fair, in terms of the level of cricket on display, with university students away it makes it tough.

"Our Northland men have a huge season with trying to win the Hawke Cup, which is our main focus, and on November 1 and 2 they have a hard game against Bay of Plenty down there and they need some good cricket before then."

Marr added that while preparing the flagship team - the Northland men - was a contributing reason for the sub-union competition, the main goal was to have a default free competition.

This year's Dargaville Shield will be a 50-over competition and would be played for by four teams.

Facing off in the competition would be Mid Western, Rodney, Whangarei North and Whangarei South.

Parlane remembers playing for the Dargaville Shield years ago, saying it was the premier competition in Northland cricket - a tag he wants to see return.