ND under pressure

Honours ended even at Cobham Oval after day one of the Plunket Shield match between Auckland and home team, and competition leader, Northern Districts.

Auckland batted first upon winning the toss and made only 227. Tim McIntosh lost opening partner Jeet Raval to the fifth ball of the innings but he went on to score 41 before he was run out when the score was 89-3.

Reece Young scored 50, Anaru Kitchen 32 and Colin de Grandhomme 41 but they were the only efforts of any note. Joseph Yovich claimed 2-37, Brent Arnel 2-46 and Bruce Martin 2-45 before Kane Williamson helped clean up the tail with 2-11.

Northern Districts replied and had struggled to 36-2 in the 18 overs of play possible with BJ Watling 19.

There was a delayed start at Queenstown where Otago was hosting Canterbury and in the 80 overs possible during the day, Canterbury, asked to bat first, was 218-4.

Rob Nicol and Michael Papps put on 134 for the first wicket but they departed within two runs of each other, Nicol falling first for 42 and Papps 83. Peter Fulton added 25 and Johan Myburgh 33.

In Napier, Central Districts had good reward for asking Wellington to bat first, dismissing the Capital side for 250. Cameron Merchant helped Wellington recover from 35-3 with 63 batting at No.3 while Luke Woodcock continued his fine runscoring season with 73 not out to help Wellington reach 250 and to carry his own haul for the season beyond 800 runs.

Doug Bracewell and 18-year-old Adam Milne did a superb job with the ball, Bracewell taking his first five-wicket bag at a cost of 49 runs while Milne took 4-49, improving his career-best from his first game of 4-52.

In seven overs before stumps, CD had reached 25 without loss.