News Article

   
  SENIOR B2 BLACK Report 23/01/10
   
  27/01/2010  
 
   
  The Senior B Black side took on fellow title contenders Parnell, looking to bounce back from the previous week’s gutting loss against competition front runners Takapuna.

With the Auckland weather about as reliable as your local MP, the wickets wasn’t a pretty sight when both sides arrived at the ground. Thankfully there was a quality artificial wicket alongside the potential swimming pool that was the grass block and the match started virtually on time.

Parnell won the toss and elected to bat which suited us fine as we were planning to bowl anyway. From the outset the opening combination of Shanan Whittaker and Jamie Bell were causing problems and runs were very hard to come by. The initial breakthrough took 16 over’s but this opened the floodgates as 32-0 quickly became 52-4 as the pressure told and the Parnell batsman began to succumb to loose shots. Led by Jamie Bell who finished the innings with the “bell ringing” figures of 18 over’s – 9 maidens – 6 wickets for 30 (including his final over going for 13), an excellent team bowling effort saw us dismiss Parnell for 110.

Our innings mirrored theirs early on with a slow start then the loss of some early wickets. However a good partnership between Ray Fa’alogo (20) and Ross Dean (aka Charles Manson – just check out the beard!) with 36 saw us to 104-6 when Ross was dismissed. With 1st innings points a virtual stone’s throw away, things got rather hairy; 107-6 became 107-7 and then 107-8. Supreme leader and mortgage guru Chris Liddell steered the ship to the calm waters of 111 (and 1st innings points) before we hit the rocks again and lost our last two wicket in two balls, giving us a solitary 1 run lead.

Batting a second time Parnell lost early wickets. At 117-7, led by Shannan Whittaker, we were circling in for the kill. Unfortunately their middle order took advantage of a couple of dropped chances and quickly pushed their score to 159-7 before Shannan came back to finish the innings off at 160. Having come back superbly to finish with the excellent figures of 6-51, Shannan registered his second haul or 6 or more wickets for the season.

With a target of 160 for the outright win we got off to the worse possible start losing a wicket in the first over without a run on the board. 1 wicket became 2, 2 wickets became 3-32 and we were in trouble. Ray again fought hard and while he was at the crease we stood a good chance of chasing down the target. When Ray fell for a well compiled 36, only Supreme leader and mortgage guru Chris Liddell stood against the tide being not out 25 when we were dismissed for 131.

All in all a very disappointing loss, in a game that was ours for the taking. The top order as a whole really needs to take more responsibility if we want to stand a chance of winning this grade.

Bevan Donovan
(Team cripple and resident old b’stard)
 
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