A Win & A Loss In Round 4

Round 4

Metalfold Industries Bloomfield Premier 3 VS Palmy Super XI

It was another must win game for us this week as we prepared to take on Palmy Super XI. For the first time this season we would go into the game with our full strength team and after last weeks emphatic win over Dannevirke we were feeling pretty confident. Captain Trout won the toss and after batting first the last few weeks he thought he’d change it up and have a bowl.

Intensity

Opening the bowling this week was Gaz and Anthony Doyle. Both bowlers struggled to find their rhythm and the runs started to flow early on. Gaz broke down at the end of his first over and was replaced by Trout who also bowled terrible. Some big shots were starting to flow until eventually one when straight up. Benjamin made good ground running around from fine leg but rolled his ankle and collapsed in a heap as the ball landed beside him. That gave Bunty a 2nd life and ended Ben’s game.

Poor technique is why Trouts bowling was terrible

With 2 bowlers down and the runs flowing Trout had to somehow inspire his team. He did this by removing himself from the bowling attack. Instantly the was a lift in the field and the bowling tightened up considerably. As usual the scorecard doesn’t actually tell you what happened but hopefully from next week on we will be back to using the good old fashioned scorebook and leave all this crappy technology behind us. SukhYEET made the first breakthrough at 59/1 and the wickets continued to fall from that point on. The super XI batters continued to get runs but their high run rate was ultimately going to be there undoing. James Pilcher, Eric Forman, Kurtis Poppe and SukhYEET Singh bowled tight lines and the pressure mounting on the batsmen forced them into shots that kept the wickets falling. Super XI lost 10 wickets for 78 runs and we all out for 137 in the 28th over. James, Kurtis and Foreplay finishing with 2 wickets each and SukhYEET finishing with 3.

Our batting innings got underway in much the same fashion as previous weeks with Jason Travolta Bary slapping boundaries and Foreplay fluffing round for a couple of runs and then getting out. Travolta looked like he was in for the long haul even with his injured hand of yam fingers. Unfortunately, another incredible catch cut his innings short and we found ourselves in trouble at 30/2. James Picher was looking steady at the crease before going out caught n bowled for 9 Randy was next up and the next to leave with 4 runs to his name.

Trout and lazer started the recovery with a little 20 run partnership before Lazer was caught on the boundary going big. That left Anthony to try and continue the rebuild. Together he and Trout worked the gaps and kept the runs ticking along. With the odd boundary from Trout and the lack of time pressure it looked as if they were going to see us home. Then it happened. Trout hit a lovely shot through midwicket and while running the 2nd run Anthony decided that his box needed adjusting. The only problem was he stopped to adjust it a metre short of his ground. The throw came in and the bails were removed. It was only now Anthony remembered that you have to be over the crease to complete a run. On the bright side, no more box adjustments were required as he finished run out for a well played 13.

Kurtis joined Trout at the crease and together they finished the match getting us through to 139/6 with Kurt ending on 18* and Trout 47*.

MVP- 3 Trout, 2 Pilch, 1 Kurtis

Scorecard.

Accelerate Automotive Bloomfield VS Wanderers.

After last week’s pleasant grass wicket on Ongley, we were this week destined for the artificial at Paneiri Park to face Wanderers.

Having to make do without Captain Dawson, stand-in Captain Glorius George won the toss and elected to bat. With barely a cloud in the sky, Trimmy and Greg ‘the Strike-rate’ Morrison took to the middle to open. With Greg turning over the strike as much as possible and some fantastic smash and bash cricket from Trimmy we got off to a flyer of a start. Eventually Trimmy went big one too many times and he was caught for 43 off 30 by Nikau Hales, giving Syam John the first of his three wickets for the day.

Trimmy in full swing

With that departure, Dan Hamid strode to the middle to help Greg continue building us a nice healthy total. After hitting a few nice shots to get his innings underway, it ended abruptly being caught for 18 off 27 by Richard Washington off the bowling of Johnny McKay. This brought Craig Trim to the middle, coming off 2 ducks from 3 innings he was very excited about the prospect of batting. He came back to join us on the wrong side of the boundary after just 3 balls with another duck to his name.

Captain George came to the wicket and hit a quick fire 15 off 12 with three fours but then became Johnny’s third victim with Shaun Washington taking the catch. With the quick fall of the wickets, Greg continued to be the rock of the innings. He was then joined by Zach and a solid partnership was building but Greg finally succumbed to the pressure and was bowled by Kurt Dooley for a hard earned 31 off 83 with a blistering strike rate of 37.34.

Steeeeeeven hitting a 6 but probably not

This brought Steeeeve to the wicket and after a few false shots he got off the mark with a six. This was the start of a quick fire partnership of 47, with Zach showing his skill and Steeeeve showing a great combination of power and dumb luck. It came to an end with Zach departing for 34 off 45, caught by Nikau off the bowling of Trevor Mitchell, shortly followed by Steeeeve on 26 off 25, bowled by Syam. On the cusp of 200 for the first time this season, Blair got 5 off 7 before being bowled by Syam and Glen ‘the wall’ Miller with a not so aggressive 1 off 6 not out and Nathan 1 off 2 not out got us over the line to set a healthy total of 206 for 8 of the 40 overs.

With confidence high after such a great time batting, we took to the field to defend 206. George and Zach combined to open the bowling. After a shaky start, George started to find a good line and length but sadly for us that did not mean much to the opening partnership of Nikau and Gurkirat Singh. Gurkirat showed the skill of a batter destined for better things as he smashed our bowlers all around the park. Nikau was very good in turning over the strike and hitting a few around himself. A few dropped catches did not help the situation.

Changes to the bowling were made and Nathan and Craig Trim came in to try and change the tide. There was glimmer of hope when Gurkirat was caught by Steeeeve off the bowling of Craig Trim for 76 of 41 balls ending an opening partnership of 128. This was quickly followed by Shaun being caught by Josh Chard off the bowling of Craig Trim for 4 off 6 balls. Kurt Dooley replaced him and with a solid 37 off 33 balls combined with Nikau to all but see out the match after a couple more dropped catches including a sitter in the slips. Kurt was eventually run out by George with just 9 required to win and 15 overs to get them.

Johnny came to the crease with Nikau. With 7 left on the board, George went for one last roll of the dice and brought Steeeeve on to bowl. Sadly, this did nothing to change the way the game was going, and the game came to end with Wanderers chasing down the total in just 26 overs finishing 208 for 3 and Nikau carrying his bat on 70 off 78 balls.

Zach recovering from the previous nights exploits

This leaves us 5th on the table with a real chance of still making the final (especially if MCA sort out the run rate debarcle on PlayHQ). We have everything to play for in round 5 vs PNBHS 3rd XI.