Sixth place is still up for grabs
If you take out your calculator and fiddle with it long enough, you can come up with some creative scenarios in which Western Suburbs and Sutherland (32 points) can snatch sixth place from Eastern Suburbs (40) over the next three weeks. For example, Easts could lose to Fairfield and Gordon, and Sutherland (say) could beat Manly and North Sydney, and about a dozen other results could fall exactly the right way. But too much of this makes our brains hurt. There are five teams within a single win of Easts, and most of them have a legitimate shot if the Dolphins slip up. St George, just one point behind, have a tough assignment this week, facing a Northern District team playing with impressive momentum. Gordon, making one of its familiar late-season charges, needs to get past second-placed Sydney. If Randwick-Petersham gets past Hawkesbury this week, its finals chances would then rest upon a final-round one-day game with a Sydney side smarting for revenge after a loss in the 50-over final last weekend.
The simplest way for this to resolve itself is for Easts to win two games. They have a tough challenge against Fairfield-Liverpool this week, and then face Gordon in what could possibly (but probably won’t) be a straight-up shoot-out for a finals place.
Randy Petes sprung an upset
This season, Sydney has treated most of its white-ball games in more or less the same way a six year-old treats a bouncy castle – trampling all over them, and flattening anyone who tries to share. So it’s something of a surprise that they’ll end the season without a white ball trophy, after bowing out in the semi-final of the Harry Solomons Little Bash and losing Sunday’s final of the Limited Overs Cup.
When we say Sydney lost, we don’t mean to suggest that Randwick-Petersham didn’t win, fair and square. But, really…. at least twice on Sunday, Sydney had the game at its mercy, and let it slip. Randwick-Petersham struggled to build a competitive total, and when Craig DiBlasio bowled the in-form Riley Ayre, the visitors had lost 4 for 113 in 26 overs. They did well from there to get as many as 232, especially as Harry Manenti wrecked the end of the innings, taking a hat trick with a mix of slower balls and rapid yorkers. That looked to be at least 30 runs below par, and seemed even worse when Ryan Felsch set about doing what he does, which is to hit new white balls enormous distances. In Daya Singh’s first over, he carved two boundaries to third man (one more intentional than the other); he followed with a neat drive and a crude slog for two more fours in Singh’s second, and then he turned his attention to Adam Semple, smacking on-drives both to and over the fence at long-on. When Felsch flicked Jason Ralston off his toes onto the hill at midwicket, Sydney was 0 for 87 from 11.3, needing 145 runs at 3.7 an over with all wickets intact. But Felsch skied the next ball to deep cover, and the innings unravelled. By the time Beau McClintock tickled a sweep only as far as Anthony Sams’ gloves, Sydney had collapsed to 5 for 131. Still, the Tigers bat deep, and that brought together Ben Manenti and Daniel Smith, who calmly restored the equilibrium by adding 44 untroubled runs for the sixth wicket. Just when Randwick-Petersham looked out of the game again, Caelan Malady removed Smith to a low catch by Sams, after which wickets kept falling as the required rate rose. In the end, Ben Manenti needed to hit 13 from Ralston’s last over. His swipe to midwicket was grassed by Maladay, and produced two runs: 11 from five. Another two reduced the target but the third ball was top-edged and landed safely in Sams’ gloves. That left young Jack Nisbet with the job of hitting nine runs from three balls, but he failed to make contact and the game ended on a farcical note when he stood out of his ground after his second airswing, and the alert Sams knocked off a bail.
So disappointment for Sydney, but all credit to Randwick-Petersham, who stuck to their work and remembered the first rule of the game – don’t give up.
Parramatta sprung an upset
The pitch at Old Kings on Saturday was on the slow side, which meant that most batsmen struggled to play with freedom, and the bowlers who prospered were the ones who took the pace off the ball. Even so, you’d have backed Manly – with Jack Edwards, Ollie Davies, Steve O’Keefe and Jay Lenton – to overcome a Parramatta side that’s out of contention for the finals. Parramatta’s attack, though, was a mixture of finger spin and medium pace, precisely the combination that was difficult on this surface, and Manly’s batsmen struggled to get out of second gear. Jack Edwards coped better than most, reaching 74, but he hit only two boundaries from the 110 balls he faced. Off-spinner Ajaypal Singh struck a critical blow, removing Lenton for only 10, and Manly’s total of 6 for 222 was more or less a par score in the circumstances. Parramatta needed it to be one of Ben Abbott’s days, and it was. In the seventh over of the innings, he carved Ryan Hadley for an inside-out six over cover, pulled the next over fine leg for six more, slapped the ball over cover for 4 and swung the last ball round to fine leg for 4 more. 21 runs came from the over, and Abbott’s 54 from 31 balls meant that Parramatta could continue the chase with minimal risk. Steve O’Keefe applied the brakes and struck twice in his last over, but with plenty of overs in hand, Nick Bertus batted calmly for 78 not out to finish off the game. It was a strange game for Manly: in the absence of their Big Bash stars, they looked unbeatable, and now they’ve tripped up when the side looks as strong as it has all season.
It’s turning into quite a season for Northern District
With two rounds remaining, Northern District holds a small but significant lead of 45 over Manly in the Club Championship. It’s turning into quite a season at Waitara – already, the Rangers have won the AW Green Shield, they lead the Third Grade competition, and they have a strong chance of featuring in the finals in every grade from Firsts to Fifths. The First Grade side held its place in the top six by winning an arm-wrestle at North Sydney, defending a modest total with disciplined bowling and eager fielding. Chris Green made his mark with a vital 54 and some typically mean bowling, besides holding three catches at long one (including a vital one to remove the threatening Tom Jagot for 61). Debutant Lachlan Fisher finished wicketless but played a vital part, allowing only 17 runs from his 8 overs. As the margin of victory was only 12 runs, it was a critical spell.
In the lower grades, the Rangers’ Seconds went down in a crazy game at Waitara, where they declared on 6 for 200 after only 39 overs, then reduced the Bears to 5 for 67. Batting at seven, Kobe Allisson whacked seven sixes in his 74, North Sydney got home with a ball to spare, and Northern District dropped to eighth, but only one point out of the top six. Third Grade was a bloodbath: North Sydney lost two for one, Jack Shelley took 4 for 6, and the Bears, dismissed for 89, had no way back. Actually there was a weird symmetry about the lower grade games: North Sydney scored 89 in Thirds, 90 in Fourths and 91 in Fifths, which is consistent, at least.
It’s pie time
It’s pie-chucking season again, that hugely enjoyable part of the season when a small army of medium pacers, accustomed to being flogged around the park by big bats on lifeless pitches, find themselves with damp and underprepared decks to play with, and exact revenge for the humiliations of rounds one to twelve. You know it’s Pie Time when you see scores like this one: bowled out for only 69, Blacktown’s Fourths won outright, firing out Sydney for 76 and 65. Marcus Jones went into the game with 10 wickets at 36 for the season, and picked up 5 for 20 over the two innings. Just as much fun was the exchange between Bankstown and Gordon. In thirds, Gordon lost its last five wickets without adding a single run: all out 49, with Basit Ali taking 4-0. But in Fifths, Bankstown crawled to 45 all out in 37.5 overs, Oscar Turner taking 4-9. Sadly, the game in Fourths at Killara was entirely washed out, or it might have been the first Premier Cricket match ever to end in a 47-all tie. The forecast for this week: more rain, and more pies.