Club fights back despite Shiran’s magnificent seven

A Grade, Division 1

ANOTHER burst of tropical showers last Thursday cut down the preparation time on the turf wickets at Wonthaggi’s Number 2 Oval and also at the Thompson Reserve in Inverloch with the result that teams winning the toss put the opposition into bat.

The same at Scorpion Park in Leongatha where Leongatha Town put the visiting Nerrena team in to bat and they found it very slow going against a lively attack and an unresponsive pitch.

The exception to the rule was Imperials on the turf at the Leongatha Recreation Reserve.

While they were also invited to bat by the opposition, Korumburra, Imps must have thought they were still in limited overs mode going by the way they attacked the challenge, scoring at almost a run-a-ball to finish with 5/302 off 55 overs.

They then declared their innings closed and set Korumburra up for a very tricky session of 20 overs at the end of the day and came away with 3/30 in a very good day of cricket for Imps, who are engaged in a tight contest for a place in the four against OMK and Korumburra.

Nerrena at Scorpion Park and OMK on the turf at Inverloch had the toughest of the conditions, early on Saturday, and managed only meagre totals, Nerrena all out for 112 and OMK only managing a score of 90.

And Wonthaggi Club looked to be going the same way when they lost a couple of quick wickets just before tea to be in a difficult position at 4/80 before the break.

A patient effort by Ben Walsh, 22 off 82 balls, was brought undone when he top-edged a simple catch to Brodie Johnston off Shiran Rathnayake and not long after that, the Island brought in a bat pad,

Daniel Mock, to apply pressure to new batter Alex Geyer.

He was almost caught there initially but, hitting out two balls later, was caught on the boundary by Kohen Beaumont, a sharp chance off Zac Brown.

But Club battled it out bravely after tea, and with Joel Brann 57 leading the way in several useful partnerships, they got the target out to a defendable 10/197 off 72.4 overs.

Shiran Rathnayake was the star with the ball, getting it to spin like a top from the town end of the ground, and enjoying a bit of drift too as he collected a memorable 7/58 off 30 overs.

The outfields at Thompson Reserve in Inverloch and Butch West Oval in Wonthaggi were lush and long, so it will be interesting to see how Phillip Island in particular handles the chase bearing in mind how crucial the result is for two of the teams fighting for a top-two finish with just three matches in an interrupted season to go.

Inverloch made a positive start to their chase and maybe able to go after a rare outright decision.

It’s worth mentioning that no batsman in the Imps’ innings of 302 managed to make a ton with openers Luke Rogers 34 off 41 balls faced and Nick Eddy 63 off 51 setting the standard and Mark Lafferty 73 off 91 and Dimithri Arachchige 67 off 70 keeping it going. The seven players to get a bat for Imps made healthy contributions in “a team effort”.