Round 1 – Manly vs North Shore – 28 Nov 2021
Full scorecard – Match Details | IDCA/Presidents Rep (cricket.com.au)
NS welcomed Manly to Hassall Park in St Ives, and thankfully the rain mostly stayed away.
Just the night before, our plans had to change when Harper was ruled out because of a COVID outbreak at school, and to complete our 12 we called up Hunter Sheehan from shadow squad.
On a slightly soggy ground and a wet pitch, Neo won the toss and elected to bat.
Manly were looking solid before Neo left a ball outside off, that cut back sharply to break his off bail, 1-6. Nelson strode to the wicket after his solid innings in the trial game, and as sometimes happens in cricket, he got a perfect first ball and was good enough to nick it, departing with a golden duck, 2-6. In some clubs the golden duck is a big funny necklace that you have to wear until you give it to the next unlucky duck.
Luke K steadied the ship, blocking his first 10 balls before getting off the mark. Luke M was the next to lose his stumps as the bowling was quite sharp with swing and cut off the seam. There was some concern that while the ground was wet, it wasn’t quite wet enough to ruin the ball, but wet enough to fatten the seam, hence the movement off the pitch.
At 3-18, Keegan had the job of digging in, and had a life when he was caught at first slip off a no ball. Keegan took the score to 35 before getting bowled to another seamer, 4-35.
Luke P enjoyed a rare first ball free hit and cleanly dispatched it to the backward square boundary. The two Lukes, K + P were looking good when Luke P smashed a full one low and hard to square leg who took a one handed catch. From the other teams reaction, it seemed like he’d never taken a catch in his life. Actually this is a similar dismissal to the trial game where we were too quick to hit the loose one, and not careful enough to keep it on the ground, 5-47.
Harry came to the wicket and was caught soon after, 6-53. Sam followed and was also bowled by a tricky delivery, 7-63.
Manly limped to the drinks break on 67 off 34 overs, with Luke K still at the crease with 32 runs and yet to find a reliable partner after watching his last 5 return to the change room. It never helps a batsman to keep seeing his partners get out, and this adds a lot more pressure. Luke K went soon after the break, 8-69.
Rishy came to the crease at no.10 and together with Max, they put on a much needed 14, before Rishy miss hit a lofted drive in the 45th over. Hunter came in with work still to do but was given LBW off his first ball and now owns a necklace. Max finished unbeaten, 10-83 off 45.
Luke K batted well for the highest score of the game, and just needed support, which is why partnerships are often more important than individual scores. Second top score of the game was sundries on 24. Sadly we had 13 free hits for not many runs.
NS had moments when they slipped over on the pitch or bowled a beamer, because of the wet conditions, but overall they bowled well and with venom, and support in the field.
After some lunch and the change room chat, Manly took to the field, to defend their 83 runs, which to be fair, on a ground this slow, where runs are cut in half, it was defendable.
Leading from the front, Sam (1-13 off 10) bowled their coach’s son in the first over, 1-0, game on.
Manly went with a new bowling plan, worked out at our washed out Friday training; to bowl Cristo as a change bowler and open with Max instead, which apart from the 4 no balls, his opening spell was very good.
NS had one player scoring at a rate of 35/100 and the other at 10/100, and thankfully with Cristo (1-18 off 8) bowling a Luke K catch removed the one scoring which took the score to 2-31 off 16 overs, just before the first break. This gave us hope that we could re-group, build pressure and force bad shots.
Manly’s first two overs back after the drinks break were disappointing and NS never felt pressured. Luke K bowled well with 0-8 off 3, Nelson kept us in the game with his 0-5 off 4, and Neo 0-5 off 3 with 2 maidens. Max (1-12 of 6), cleaned up one of their batsmen but all too late and NS reached the target in the 38th over, 3-84. Rishy didn’t quite find his range this time (0-11 off 2), all the while his commitment and effort was excellent. Harry (0-6 off 1) and Luke P (0-5 off 1) didn’t get the luxury of a second over because of the low score we had to defend. 12 wides and 9 no-balls in 38 overs is an area we can improve.
