Growth in cricket in the primary/intermediate school area is reflected in participation numbers in the annual MILO Cup and Shield which reach their finals this week.

The MILO Cup for boys will be played between Havelock North Intermediate, from Havelock North, in the Hawke's Bay and Rosedale Intermediate from Invercargill.

The MILO Shield for girls will be played between Viscount Navigator School in Auckland and the Woodend Primary School in North Canterbury.

This year 165 schools played off in the Cup section while 84 schools played in the Shield section.

Thursday's finals at Fitzherbert Park in Palmerston North will cap this year's event.

The boys will play a 35-over game and the girls a 25-over game.

New Zealand Cricket's national development manager Alec Astle said entries for next year in the competition suggested that already, the numbers taking part will be greater than this year.

Getting through to the finals is worthwhile. Teams have all their travel and accommodation paid while the winners receive $600 of cricket equipment and the losers $300 of cricket equipment.

Astle said that this summer over 90 MILO summer squad cricket development officers were operating throughout New Zealand and visiting primary schools and recruiting children into the MILO programmes.

There are 128 MILO Have-A-Go Cricket Centres catering for 4209 children and 32 MILO Kiwi Cricket Centres involving another 817 children.

These centres are organised and run by more than 1000 parents and teaches who have all trained as coaches under the scheme.

"It is New Zealand Cricket's aim to have every child in the country able to try cricket, and to have the game played in every schoolground and backyard," Astle said.

© CricInfo