FLANNELLED FOOLERY: 23 DECEMBER 2018

Cricket Round-Up By GREG PRINGLE*

Country continue to cruise

As we head into a four-week break in the cricket season, Premiers Country continue to cruise through 2018/19 season brushing aside all challengers so far.

They did it again at Millthorpe against a team on the rise in recent weeks.

Winning their previous three games and playing at home, Millthorpe would have been confident of being competitive with the Premiers.

Country batted first, and it was opener Brett Wykes who, on his last warning prior to being dropped for having a lean season to date, top-scored with 73.

Andrew Heath, another Country player having an ordinary season, also came good scoring 54.

That knock should save Andrew from getting a tap on the shoulder from selectors, but time will tell.

Dan Toynton, as usual reliable, scored 30 not out and Country finished their innings at 8/191.

There was eerie silence come over the stunned crowd of 11 plus three dogs who witnessed Nigel Brazier record a rare duck.

Rumor has it Nigel was star struck playing against Phil Donato and was a mess.

Millthorpe’s best bowler was Sean Donato taking 4/28 from his 10 overs. Great figures.

P Joyce (2/32) and B Sykes (1/22) also bowled well.

Millthorpe got their chase off to a great start, not losing their first wicket until the score was 56 when S Peace was dismissed for 32.

Fellow opener T Lowe went on with the job and top scored with 75.

Another top order batsman S Badgery scored 27.

Massive signing for Millthorpe and Local Member for Orange Phil Donato gave a classic example of why politics and sport don’t mix, when was was dismissed for one batting at first drop.

Unfortunately, seven of Millthorpe’s batsman followed Phil with none of them making double figures and despite their great start fell away falling well short of the target and all out 138.

Dan Toynton capped off a great game and was Country’s best bowler taking 3/25.

Nigel Brazier composed himself, had a bowl and took 2/ 27.

In the second game at the Rec, Cudal batted first against Molong Bowlers.

What a farce it was, with Cudal all out for 83 in one of their worst ever performances.

Batting at seven, G Spratt top scored with 21.

Lee Cornish (17), Andrew Smith (12) and Jock Hough (11) all got starts but couldn’t go on with it.

Adam Clunes (0), Scott Troth (0) and Scott Barrett (1) had games they would rather forget.

Rowan Wilson was almost unplayable on turf, taking 5 for 22 from his 10 overs.

Chasing the small total was relatively easy for the Bowlers and they passed Cudal’s total losing just four wickets.

Matt Tink (18 not out), Chris Beatty (21) and C Steahorn (21 not out) contributed to the win.

The only concern out of the Bowlers camp after the win is the sudden loss of form of their star batsman David Hobbs who for the third game in a row fell cheaply.

David hasn’t played well since sacking his coach, friend, mentor and masseuse Glenn Meehan.

Hopefully over the Christmas break they can patch things up and David will be amongst the runs again.

Jock Hough bowled well taking 2/19.

Cudal are struggling of late and appear to be a shadow of the team that has made most of the recent Grand Finals.

They will need to regroup over Christmas and focus, or risk not making the finals for the first time in many years.

The competiton now table stands at Country 59, Cudal 43, Bowlers 43, Millthorpe 39, Magpies 32.

*Greg Pringle is Secretary/Treasurer of Molong District Cricket. He plays for Molong Magpies but swears he is as hard, if not harder, on his own guys as the opposition.