The Students are off to another grand final
Sydney University has won its way through to play Northern District in the grand final of the First Grade Limited Overs competition and, not for the first time this season, the most appropriate response is: how the hell did that just happen? For about three-quarters of the match at David Phillips, University of NSW was winning in a canter. Declan White knocked the top of the visitors’ innings, taking the key wickets of Hayden Kerr, Nick Larkin and Damien Mortimer in an incisive opening spell. Tim Cummins (51) stabilised the innings with a responsible captain’s knock but after Ryan Meppem grabbed three quick wickets, it took some lower-order defiance from Devlin Malone and Caelan Maladay to boost the Students to a barely-respectable 161. White wrapped up the innings to finish with a well-deserved 5-32, and the Bees looked to be cruising when Jack Attenborough and Tom Scoble peeled 40 runs from the first ten overs. The Sydney University attack kept things tidy, but the Bees reached 1 for 119, needing only 43 runs from the last 15 overs. At which point, Max Hope was introduced into the attack. Hope has regained his First Grade spot this season, making a strong contribution with his forthright left-handed batting and sure slip catching, and no impact at all with the ball – in fact, in his 33 First Grade matches, he’d taken only seven wickets with his orthodox finger-spin. But in his first over, Suffan Hassan missed a swipe across the line and was lbw; a few balls later, Ben Green was bowled, aiming to hit over mid-wicket, and when Attenborough’s chip over cover was held by Malone, Hope had taken 3-6. Caelan Maladay bowled a suffocating spell that was rewarded with two wickets, and Hope had Meppem and Krishna Padmanabhan deftly stumped by Cummins from successive deliveries, the Bees were deep in trouble. Eight wickets fell for 25 runs, Hope grabbing 6-16. The last pair, Hayden McLean and Declan White, needed 18 runs from the final three overs, but Kerr and Hugo Ikeda closed out the innings ruthlessly, leaving Sydney University the improbable winners by 12 runs.
We don’t have a top six yet, but we’re getting there
The makeup of the top six in First Grade became only marginally clearer after Round 12’s results. Sydney University virtually guaranteed themselves a spot in the finals with a demolition job on Blacktown, which began with a massive opening stand between Jordan Gauci (156) and Don Butchart (115). Manly are all but assured of a finals berth too, after excellent pace bowling by Ryan Hadley and Mickey Edwards redeemed a limp batting effort to defeat Sydney by just 37 runs. St George consolidated its place in a low-scoring win over University of NSW, in which Trent Copeland followed his 6-54 with a cool-headed innings and a match-winning stand with Jono Craig-Dobson. Northern District looked like losing touch with the leaders when it lost its ninth wicket still needing 18 runs to beat Mosman, but Mitchell Crayn led the Rangers to the points with a brilliant 110 not out. And Randwick-Petersham surged into the top six by defeating Wests.
But there were some costly slip-ups. Bankstown were outplayed by Fairfield, and dropped out of the six. Mosman, North Sydney and Sydney can now reach the finals only by a string of freak results. And Penrith’s momentum was slowed, possibly fatally, by a draw with Sutherland. Of the teams currently outside the top six, only Bankstown, Parramatta, Fairfield and Penrith have any real chance of getting there – and they’ll need a lot of luck. The biggest contest in Round 13 is the clash between Manly and Northern District, which the Rangers may need to win in order to remain in the top six.
Parramatta bats backwards
Weird game of the round was at North Sydney Oval, where the Bears won the toss and invited Parramatta to bat. It looked like a sensible decision when the consistently excellent James Campbell (supported by James Aitken, whose run-up and delivery lead Five Things to believe that a comeback may yet be possible) made good use of a greenish pitch and reduced Parramatta to 8 for 89. What happened next made absolutely no sense at all: Evan Pitt and Alex Evans added 85 runs for the ninth wicket, and then Pitt and Michael Sullivan shared a last-wicket partnership of 90. Pitt has been highly reliable with the ball this season, and no more than handy with the bat. But he settled in quietly before announcing himself by driving Campbell twice to the cover boundary. Aitken thought he had Pitt dropped behind the wicket with the score on 130, but there were few other chances and not much tailend swiping. The left-handed Evans cracked Aitken over mid-wicket for 6, pulled another 6 from Harrison May, and drove confidently. Pitt reached 98 before he fended at May, but got the ball no further than Thomas Jagot at second slip. In their reply, North Sydney suffered an almost identical collapse, losing 8-91: Pitt took the first two wickets, and Sullivan (5-29) bowled impressively. But the Bears’ tail couldn’t triple the score, and Parramatta took the points. To make the game even odder, Sheridon Gumbs made his debut in Firsts for North Sydney, but left the game (to join the England Under 19s) at the end of the first day, and so didn’t get to bat. Only a few weeks ago, North Sydney sat high on the competition table, but this defeat may well have ended their season.
Sam Konstas is a machine
Sutherland’s strong performance against Penrith was built on the foundation of an opening stand of 224 between Andrew Deitz (101) and, inevitably, Sam Konstas. The partnership was a new First Grade record for Sutherland, which was something of a surprise since Deitz hasn’t opened the batting since making a duck in Second Grade in Seconds four seasons ago, and has never previously opened in First Grade. Nor had he ever scored a Premier Cricket hundred. Konstas, though. His innings made him the first player to score 1000 runs in all grades for Sutherland in his first season with the club. Phil Jaques (593 in 2nds and 223 in PGs, a total of 816) and Jason Young (812 in 1sts) – both in 1996-97 – had previously been the most successful first-season players for the Sharks. Konstas has also equalled the club record for most centuries in a season with four, joining Les Johns (1985-86), Justin Kenny (1990-91), Matthew Bradley (1996-97), Grant Davies (2005-06), Phil Jaques (2005-06) and Jamie Brown (2015-16 & 2017-18). This is the second consecutive season that Konstas has achieved both feats, having scored 1139 runs with 4 centuries last season for St George. He might do some real damage to the Sutherland record books once he finishes school.
Strange things happen to leg spin prodigies
Hawkesbury took the bold step last round of introducing leg spinner Aarush Soni to First Grade – at the age of 15 years and 83 days. That made Soni the youngest ever Hawkesbury First Grader, and (by our count) the eighth youngest First Grader ever. It didn’t go entirely to plan: Soni bowled three spells, and was punished pretty heavily, as Easts ran up 352 (although, unusually in a total of that size, no-one made more than Adam Sidhu’s 59). Curiously, though, playing for Easts was Sam Robson, who was only 16 when he made his First Grade debut – for University of NSW. Then, like Soni, he was a leg-spinner who went in last. No one then foresaw that he would develop into an opening batsman for Middlesex, England and Easts, whose bowling was occasionally called upon as a last resort. All of which is to say that the talented Soni could end up in any number of places. Or he may, like Robson, remember his roots as a leggie: allowed a rare turn with the ball last Saturday, Robson wrapped up the Hawkesbury innings with a spell of 3-18.