MATCH REPORTS - ROUND 7

MATCH REPORT - 1ST GRADE VS HAWKESBURY AT OWEN EARLE OVAL (DAY 2)

SUCC 7/248 dec
55.0 overs

N Larkin 143 (134)
B Joy 2/32/13.0 overs & 4/30/16.0

&

3/43
7.0 overs

DEF O/R & FIRST INNINGS

Hawkesbury 99
38.4 overs

&

188
70.3 overs

JA Brett 64 (93)
MN Shinwari 2/28/10.0 & 2/26/4.0

The much-anticipated trip to Benson’s Lane couldn’t have come at a better time, fresh off a clutch victory against the ND’s. With temperatures rumoured threatening the mid-40’s, the flies aplenty and Benson’s gorgeous ‘manure-scented-dam-cooled’ breeze, the boys were pumped for retribution for our T20 defeat to the Hawks just a few weeks prior. Cass did his best for the batters by forgetting the NASH, and a winning toss saw us heading into the field.

On a wicket that looked to offer a bit, Cass made the early breakthrough. On his much-awaited return, Devlin wasted no time in making an impact with a direct hit runout leaving the Hawks two down early. And didn’t he love it! With the two dangermen at the crease, Robbo brought on Dugs to extract some spice from the wicket. Some fast-short pitched bowling soon saw Dugs in on the action; Qureshi edging the carrot behind to TC for a comfortable catch. Robbo then gave TC his second catch of the morning, with Mckay strangled down the leg side for 10. The Hawks scrambling at 4-30. After another wicket to Cass, the students sniffed an opportunity to wrap up our time in the field before the hottest part of the day arrived. An inventive counter attack from keeper Ryan Mizzi saw the ball fly to all parts of Owen Earle, and provided some much-needed hope for the Hawks in setting a competitive total. BJ’s impressive season continued, as he and Dev sustained the pressure and quickly dismantled the Hawks tail with two wickets each. Dugs returned, taking Mizzi for the last wicket. The Hawks 99 all out. 

Nick and Niv made early inroads to the Hawks score, Niv solid in defence as Nick consistently rattled the pickets behind point as we see so often. The opening partnership untested until the scored reached 71. With one hand on six points, we began to accelerate. Nick looked towards the BBL as he sent four big sixes out of Owen Earle, accompanied by his 17 fours which saw him end up on 143. Robbo the other batsman to get going, finishing not out on 36. The students ending the day 7/278.

After some poorly adjudicated NASH, some standard Mortimer carry-on and some warm-up mind games with the Hawks, Robbo declared the innings closed giving us the full 96 for a crack at 10 points. The morning session started slowly, with the wicket looking far more batter friendly than the previous week. With 15 minutes to lunch and the score at 89, BJ made the opening breakthrough as he has done so often this year. Then another. And another. The students on top again as we took the Hawks to lunch at 3-96. With the wicket offering little for the quicks, Dev and Niv took the reins and spun their way through the middle session and the Hawks batting order. Dev and BJ finishing with four apiece, and Niv with two.

With rain threatening and 40 to get, the batters went on the attack. Dummer, Morts and TC all hit boundaries to chase down the modest target in seven overs, taking the Students to the top of the table. 

C Dummer

MATCH REPORT - 2ND GRADE VS HAWKESBURY AT UNIVERSITY OVAL (DAY 2)

SUCC 3/171
38.0 overs

D Miller 74* (122)
K Tate 2/25/13.0 & 3/33/20.2

&

6/122
27.0 overs

DEF

Hawkesbury 166
51.3 overs

GP Venica-Singh 40 (25)
C De Kretser 2/53/9.0

&

Hawkesbury 181
70.2 overs

I Walker 46 (106)
B Roughan 3/33/9.0

MATCH REPORT - 3RD GRADE VS HAWKESBURY AT BENSONS LANE OVAL 2 (50 OVER)

SUCC 5/231
50.0 overs

AG Shaw 100 (119)
R Greaves 3/33/9.3

DEF

Hawkesbury 210
48.3 overs

B Bradshaw 37 (35)
S Khan 2/41/9.0

Round 6 saw the Books make the long journey out to Bensons Lane to take on the mighty Hawks. This match will be remembered for two things: Alex Shaw’s delectable century and the last gasp Nash Ball victory by ‘The Olds’.

The Olds were looking to maintain their undefeated streak and it appeared to be another clinical performance as they bossed their way to a 2-0 lead. The match took an incredible turn as Hayden Storey (who had been driven to the ground by his father after attending his work Christmas party the night before) complacently abandoned his position as goalkeeper to roam forward and join the attack. The Young were able to capitalise and scored two soccer goals to go ahead 4-2. 

Things were looking dire for the Olds who were clearly rattled by their late collapse, however there was still time for one last drive forward. Alex Shaw won the ball at left fullback and was able to beat a man, he marauded forward and got his head up, Shaw played an appetising long diagonal ball to Hill who was unmarked on the right wing. With the ball landing in Hill’s burrowsome lap he assessed his options and saw Michael Robinson ghost towards the back post with Brayden Dilley isolated at centre back. A delicious left to right spiral pass was thrown on top of the head of Dilley who was left rooted to the spot as Robinson launched himself at the ball and met it with a downward header that beat an outstretched Matt Johns (who had been brilliant in goals thus far). Pandemonium ensued as the final score read 6-4… much to the bemusement of the Hawkesbury players and supporters who were wondering why these five idiots were running around hooting and hollering like they had just won a grand final.

Due to a biblical storm on Thursday evening the covers at Bensons had been blown off and the pitch left somewhat wet. This coaxed the Hawkesbury captain into bowling first as he won the toss.

Dilley (33) and Storey (27) were measured in the opening overs and were able to lay a sound platform as they absorbed the early pressure and counter punched with great efficiency. The dismissal of Storey brought Shaw (100) to the crease and he began to accumulate in typical fashion. A couple of quick wickets fell towards the end of the middle season and Nivek Tanner (53*) joined Shaw. They increased the pace expertly and were able to dismember the Hawks attack who had no answers to the exquisite stroke play on offer. 5/231 was the final score and the Students were quietly confident with their position at halftime.

Hawkesbury were measured in the early exchanges of their innings and their middle order all made starts, threatening to take the game away from us at different stages. Our bowlers to their credit stuck to their task and were able to find timely breakthroughs, with each wicket came an increase in pressure that ultimately was the undoing of the Hawkesbury chase. Pick of the bowlers were Rex Greaves (3-39) and Niv Tanner (2-32).

Back to back wins for the 3s boys who are aiming to sit in the top six at the Christmas break. Another tough encounter awaits in the form of Eastern Suburbs Dolphins.

J Hill

MATCH REPORT - 4TH GRADE VS HAWKESBURY AT ST PAUL’S OVAL (50 OVER)

SUCC 192
42.1 overs

C Hathurusinghe 29
S Canagasingham 3/16/10.0

DEF

Hawkesbury 135
41.1 overs

LA Devaney 38
M Abdullah 3/45/10.0

Due to some scheduling snafus (snafi?) the 4s boys went unreported the last two weeks or so (we lost then won FYI). At any rate, your scribe is back with a summary of another comfortable victory to the Students which leaves us 2nd on the table via the remarkable situation of the bees also being 5 from 6 after being bowled out for 40 batting 2nd last week…

An intriguing pitch met the Books as we returned to Fortress Paul’s and as arrogance dictated we won the toss and elected to bat first. There were some new faces on show earning a cap in 2020/21, or so it seemed (actual caps tbc via our man circumventing an embargo via the SA shipping facility, the details of which are not suitable for publication in this forum or indeed knowledge of whatsoever).

At any rate, Adam Sidhu made his 4th grade debut (after playing a few PGs games etc), and the key attraction was Kevin Jacob coming back to the fold. The great man has played at all levels, 3s finals, 1st class Canberra, whatever he’s been doing the past 2 years, etc and so on. So it was nice to have him back on board.  

And wouldn’t you know it, they were paired together. 

Kevvy and Sids strode to the crease and made things look remarkably easy. Such was their dominance that their 6 over 43 run partnership (with a fair amount of sundries) took them to a grand position. Which they promptly got out and the next bunch of us tried to assume it was easy. 1/55 became 7/116 and all of a sudden the Books were looking for a cheeky latter order bombardment, for the 2nd time this year.

Enter Prakhar Sharma and Shehan “Cantgetoutasingham” (sic). A couple of interesting moments (the bloke at cover missing a catch whilst trying to grab it one-handed for some reason, however the result was a game defining 40 run partnership that set the Hawks 193 to win.

Bowling wise it was a great start from the big quick Cullen, with two early wickets to unplayable deliveries. Shehan carried on his great form with a typically miserly 3/16 from his 10, and strong work from Lew Ansell, Prakhar and Peter Brazzers meant that the Hawks were never really in the hunt, and when the final catch was taken it was a pretty comfortable 60 run victory to the good guys.

Next week another stern test awaits against the roosters at Trumper Park, and a chance to cement our spot in the top two and continue to roll on to xmas and beyond.

A Cowan

MATCH REPORT - 5TH GRADE VS HAWKESBURY AT BENSONS LANE OVAL 3 (50 OVER)

SUCC 30
17.5 overs

M Shanahan 1/12/4.0
M Miles 1/12/4.0

DEF BY

Hawkesbury 2/35
8.3 overs

C Lucas 16*
J Chapman 4/8/8.5

After making the journey to Bensons Lane we hope to turn our seasons luck around and put out a good performance on the field.

The lads were out there early looking at the deck and trying to make some early plans on what might be a good scenario!

Warm up was started with a healthy game of Nash and some competitive drills lead by our director of cricket Cam Borgas trying to get a positive start to the days proceedings.

Hawkesbury won the toss and elected to bowl!

It was all down hill from there! We batted poorly to say the least! It was a stream of wickets and our top scorer being sundries on 10 our highest team score was 4 and we had 5 players not troubling the scorers. Our day was over before it began posting a total of 30.

Hawkesbury chases the runs with 8 wickets in hand and It’s back to the drawing board again.

T Lamont

MATCH REPORT - METRO GOLD VS GORDON CC AT ST PAUL’S OVAL (50 OVER)

SUCC 225
49.5 overs

R Varatharajah 52 (47)
Y Dalvi 3/20/5.0

DEF

Gordon 212
47.5 overs

N Russo 66 (56)
J Woods 5/31/7.5

MATCH REPORT - METRO BLUE VS GEORGES RIVER CC AT BLAND OVAL (50 OVER)

SUCC 6/157
29.2 overs

DEF

Georges River 156
41.3 overs

T Sherwin 42
M Magoulias 2/27/5.0