The gremlins were let loose on Auckland's cricket yesterday, especially at Victoria and Ken Maunder Parks and at the Birkenhead Reserve.

There was a delay of 90 minutes before a start was made at Victoria Park in the vital match between Grafton and Cornwall.

Very late in the day at Ken Maunder Park, between home side, Suburbs New Lynn and Howick Pakuranga, 11 wickets fell in the space of 35 runs.

At Birkenhead in a match between the leading first grade sides, Birkenhead and Waitakere City, the ball acted like a demon on a fast, bouncing wicket and brought about a 10-wicket defeat of the visiting side.

It all meant that Grafton won the first round in the premier grade and Cornwall hung on to fourth position and a place in the finals, Howick Pakuranga finished the round second and Suburbs ended second from bottom of the ladder. And Birkenhead has taken a big lead in the first grade with three rounds to play.

The delay at Victoria Park occurred when was deemed to be too wet. The Ken Maunder and Birkenhead debacles were caused as much by bad batting as anything else.

Parnell, promoted at the end of last season, managed to take first innings points from East Coast Bays and join Grafton, Howick Pakuranga and Cornwall in the championship round-robin starting on February 24. The remaining sides will fight to avoid relegation with points from the first round carried through in both competitions.

Auckland Aces players, Aaron Barnes with 112 for Cornwall, and Terry Crabb with 9-28 for Birkenhead were the leading performers, but there was a special cheer for Howick Pakuranga's veteran off-spinner, Ian Shackelford who, after bemoaning ad nauseum the dropping of four catches by his fielders, ended with 7-106.

There was a dramatic finish to the match after Suburbs New Lynn had seemed safely on the road to a vital first innings lead. Its last six wickets fell for 25 runs and Howick Pakuranga had the lead. But when the eastern side batted again Chris Lee, the SNL skipper, took three wickets from four balls in his opening over and HP were 10-5 when the end came.

Round 7 – day 2 of two-dayer. - Premier. – Takapuna 205 and 71 (S Sharp5-25, N Maguire 3-38) drew with North Shore 209-9 dec (J Stuart 52no, J Pemberthy 47, G Andrews 34; R Henderson 5-63, L Armstrong 4-40) and 36-1. East Coast Bays 134 and 158-9 dec (M Mimmack 45, M Sanders 33; W Wheeler 4-43, R Henderson 3-29) drew with Parnell 161 (T McIntosh 45no; M Haslam 4-36, C Brown 3-25) and 130-6 (A Reddy 48; M Haslam 4-45). Grafton 224 drew with Cornwall 342 (A Barnes 112, D Storer 82, R Morgan 51; G Coleman 5-57) Howick Pakuranga 278 and 10-5 (C Lee 3-1) drew with Suburbs New Lynn 245 (J Vujnovich 75, D Cederman 58, B Mathers 36; I Shackelford 7-106). Points: Grafton 82.96, Howick Pak 82.2, Parnell 75.85, Cornwall 64.33, North Shore 62.33, ECB 57.29, SNL 51.66, Takapuna 50.46. First grade. – Ellerslie 154 and 192-7 dec (J Gibson 40, N Morrice 32; M Lindenberg 3-76) drew with University Akarana 156-5 dec (T Emtage 46; M Cribbins 3-11) and 180-8 (N Smeeton 83, I Aitchison 47; Gibson 4-66) Eden Roskill 172 and 93 (D Langdon 7-41) lost to Papatoetoe 300-7 (G Shaw 96, A Clarke 50, N Edwards 46, C Boroughs 32) by an innings and 35 runs. Waitakere City 138 and 71 (T Crabb 9-28) lost outright to Birkenhead City 168-7 (A Wright 67, M Clarke 33no) by 10 wickets. Points: Birkenhead 101.91, Waitakere 86.30, Papatoetoe 72.06, University 55.8, Eden Roskill 49.95, Ellerslie 49.36.

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