Griggs' maiden century leaves India 86 behind CD

It was not surprising the Indians showed little interest in starting their second innings in the National Bank tour three-day match against Central Districts in dull light at Napier this afternoon.

Bad weather, the curse of the New Zealand summer, is forecast for almost the entire country tomorrow and it may be doubtful whether there is any more play in this match.

That would leave India just as badly off as New Zealand in the pre-Test preparations.

The New Zealand team is to be named tomorrow morning for the first Test starting at the Basin Reserve in Wellington on Thursday.

Clearly India have struggled to focus on this pre-Test, pre-one-day warm-up and their performance against Central Districts (CD) has been lacklustre, to say the least.

Their batting produced just 209 and some loose shots, the bowling was on both sides of the wicket and often too short, and the ground fielding was second-rate.

So the second day ended with Central Districts' declaration at 295 for nine wickets, a lead of 86 runs, when the Indians accepted the offer of the light from umpires Brent Bowden and Doug Cowie just after 5pm and never returned to McLean Park.

Central Districts had the same offer since 3.27pm, but not surprisingly returned to the crease shortly after 4pm when young batsman Bevan Griggs completed a fine century.

Griggs has been relegated from CD wicket-keeper with the return of Martyn Sigley this season, and could well have been the man left out of the starting side for this match if skipper Jacob Oram had been declared fit.

But Oram was ruled out, Griggs played and the rest is history. He did several rescue acts for the side last season and he needed another today when five wickets went for 20 runs from the time Mathew Sinclair was dismissed at 133.

Sinclair, who was in need of a good score in front of national selector Ross Dykes if he was to improve his chances of Test selection, scored 52 before he fell too a catch off Ajit Agarkar just after the morning session drinks break. It was the 28th half-century of his first-class career.

Earlier, his partner in the 92-run second-wicket stand Craig Spearman was out for 58, caught and bowled by Tinu Yohannan.

Griggs' previous highest score was 76 and his batting average was 24.33.

He had partnerships of 47 with Michael Mason (21), of 37 with Brent Hefford (nine) and an unbeaten 58 for the final wicket with Lance Hamilton (nine not out). Griggs hit one six and 11 fours in his 150-ball innings.

By the time he had finished he had achieved the first 500 runs of his first-class career and his batting average was left on a much more healthy 29.88.

Although the wicket had flattened out, it's an indictment on the Indian bowling that Mason, Hefford and Hamilton faced 21.4 overs between them and rarely looked like getting out.

Agarkar was the best with four wickets for 50 from 16.2 overs, but Ashish Nehra (one for 69), Yohannan (one for 62) and Sanjay Bangar (one for 35) all struggled for penetration and were too short. Griggs in particular feasted square of the wicket.

Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh looked the most dangerous but he too gave runs away with regularity. He sent down 20 overs and took two for 73.