The Bottle-O Albion Eagles where Bishopscourt No 1 up against North East Valley – James Brown again took the helm with Taylor away. We had to make a late change after Patrick Arnold rolled his ankle in warmup, so Luke Ritchie came back into the team. After a long delay we finally got underway at just before 2pm in a 29 over aside match. NEV won the toss and decided to bat on what looked like a very good track.
Mason Clarke and Gordy Chatfield took the new ball and it was Gordy who took two early wickets to have Valley at 16/2. Valley was scoring at a good clip when Gordy claimed his 3rd in the 10th over and finished his allotted six overs on the bounce with the good figures of 3/28. Larry Vimukthi took over from Gordy and had success in his 1st over and then a second in his 3rd but Valley was well placed at 102/5 in the 18th over. Larry also bowled his six on the trot and claimed a third to finish his spell with 3/31. At this point we lost control as Valley really acerated the scoring in the last 7 overs where they scored 82 runs to finish with a very challenging score for the Eagles to chase of 204/7.
Hugo Bogue and Lewis Garden got the chase off to a steady start when Lewis was out in the 6th over with the score at 31. Unfortunately, another wicket shortly after brought Josh Olliver to the wicket with Hugo who was know scoring freely. Ther score had advanced to 94 in the 15th over when Hugo was undone for an excellent 75 (off just 53 balls). Dylan Fletcher joined Josh and they keep things moving before Dylan, who was looking very good, was out off the last ball of the 20th over for 28 (off 26 balls) and the score was at 127/4. The required rate was 8.7 but the boys felt this was still manageable until Josh was dismissed for 23 in the2 2nd over. Things got tough from this point on as Valley bowled very well and wickets keep falling as we tried to keep up with the required run rate – nice little better than a run a ball cameos from Mason (12) and Gordy (14) were not quite enough as the Eagles ended up 19 runs short of the target.
The Turkeys played at Memorial against Taieri College. It was always going to be a tough game for the Turkeys with a shortage of available players and with them also lending two players to help out the Kilda they only ended up with nine players. After losing the toss the Turkeys were asked to bat. Tristan Gaffaney and Samson Ferrar got the team off to a solid start putting on 32 before Tristan was out. With the score at 48/2 Liam Fisher joined Samson and together they took the score to 114 when Samson was out for a well made 44. Wickets then started to fall and when Liam was out at 150 for an excellent 65 the end was near as the final score sat at 155/8 in the 37th over.
Early wickets were needed and skipper for the day Thomas Harris and Jason Marshall both obliged to leave Taieri at 28/2. Jason struck again with the score at 55 but that was unfortunately the end of the wickets for the Turkeys as Taieri moved to 157/3 and a good win for them. So that is the end of a very difficult season for the Turkeys with playing numbers being a real issue – when they had good numbers they tended to perform well, but sadly when numbers were light the opposite was normally the result. A big thank you to Richie Buchanan, who due to injury only managed 6 games this season, who organised the team each week and also to Louis Clydesdale who really stepped up this season to led the team on the field.
The Kilda were at Culling against the Cavaliers – a win in this match would ensure a “home” final in a fortnight. As mentioned above the Kilda were light on numbers and Louis Clydesdale and Connor Boreham stepped in to make sure the team had 11 players
After winning the toss skipper Scott McCormack decided on bowling with Louis and Ryan Wheeler taking the new ball – Louis claimed the first wicket and Ryan chimed in with two to have the Cavaliers in some trouble at 42/3. Connor and Devin Stapley then took a wicket each to further reduce the Cavs to 72/5. The skipper took the next wicket at 93 before a good partnership developed. Louis came back into the attack and made the break-thru and then moped up the tail to end with 4/28 as the Cavs were dismissed for 151 in the 33rd over.
As usual Scott Chapman and Chris Morris opened up for the Kilda and they quickly took the score to 105 when Scott was out for 47 off just 42 balls. At 132 veteran Andy Arnold was out for 14 and another quick wicket had the Kilda at 140/3 – Chris then guided the team to a seven-wicket victory and again had ‘red ink’ to be 69* as the winning runs were achieved in the 21st over.