Molyneux Park is back on the
domestic schedule - all it needs is the green light from New
Zealand Cricket.
Twenty/20 and one-day fixtures have been pencilled in for
December 27 and January 9 respectively.
Alexandra has not seen provincial cricket since the venue
lost the right to host elite cricket at the end of the
2008-09 season. But Otago Cricket Association chief executive
Ross Dykes is confident the ground "will come up to scratch".
"We've got a trial game scheduled there for late October,
which will give it a good test," Dykes said.
"But all the work that has been done since the end of last
summer by [new groundsman] Wayne Walker is on track. He just
needs some good weather, of course, because the end of
October is pretty early to get a pitch up."
With the first-class season getting under way on November 9,
Dykes said Otago cricket could not delay the venue's trial
any later. Also, with Otago Country playing in the first
round of the Dunedin club one-day competition this summer,
the ground would see a good level of cricket as early as
October 2.
Pitch reports from those games should give a good indication
of how the wicket was playing, Dykes said.
However, if the ground failed to regain its warrant of
fitness, the rest of the region's cricket grounds could come
under much more pressure, Dykes said.
"We have not finalised a contingency plan. There are a couple
of other grounds which we could use but we have not gone into
that too deeply, because we are very confident Molyneux Park
will be OK.
"Suffice to say, we have grounds in Oamaru, Queenstown and
Invercargill which could absorb some pressure if we need to,
although we are putting pressure on them already."
Dunedin cricket fans will have to wait until March 3 before
they can watch the Volts play in the city. The University
Oval is out of commission for most of the summer while work
to expand the ground is carried out. But three first-class
games are scheduled for the Oval late in the summer.
While it was disappointing for the city, Dykes said a greater
reward was in sight.
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