Both B & C Grade picked up 8 wicket wins on Saturday with early finishes on the cards for players following quick run chases.
🏏 B Grade – 🦁 Moe v Gormandale 🐯
Moe hosted Gormandale for the third meeting between the sides this season. Every game has seen vastly different lineups for both teams. Just 4 Moe players featured all 3 times (Farmer, Murphy, Whitney & Oakley. Moe had 6 changes from last week’s loss to Imperials.
🐯 Gormandale Innings
Gormandale won the toss and batted. Fletcher White (7) hit a four and edged a three off Robert Blunt in the first 3 balls of the innings. White tried to repeat the boundary when it wasn’t quite on and chopped on in Blunt’s next over.
Blunt bowled the Tigers leading run scorer Gavin Swan for 4 and should’ve probably have had 4 scalps with a couple of overs left in allotment, but caught behind chances went down off Armstrong (5) & Scurlock. Stand-in keeper Oakley’s blushes were spared for Armstrong’s chance as Ritvik bowled him out the very next over. As for Scurlock (on around 20 at the time), it proved a little more costly in the innings – but ultimately, not the match.
Paddy Spiteri returned and took a blinder in close off of Ritvik to dismiss Fulham 🦆, Gormandale 4/27. After some Scurlock resistance, Smallwood became Ritvik’s third victim, caught by Blunt. Ritvik finished with 3/33 from his 9 and Blunt had figures of 2/25. The Tigers 5/61 from 18.
Jarryd Atkinson (1/18 off 9) & Daniel Farmer (0/13 off 9) bowled next and bowled economically, Atkinson retaking the lead in a close Moe B Grade bowling aggregate (four bowlers separated by 3 wickets).
Mark Whitney took 2/11 (5) & Ash Savige 1/8 (4.2) to wrap up the innings late. Scurlock falling to Whitney for 63 in the 43rd over before a couple of late wickets saw the Tigers bowled out for 115 in their final over of the innings.
🦁 Moe Innings
Michael Johnstone opened the batting in Finn’s absence, and unfortunately found himself involved in a run out for the third consecutive match, Whitney dismissed for a 🦆. Johnstone (14) snicked off to White off Farley (1/34) in the 5th over, 2/27 with Savige 9. Savige was joined by Paddy Spiteri and the pair blasted Moe home in no time, seeing out the good balls, punishing the bad ones through the quick outfield and rode their luck a little along the way with a few chances (mainly off Savige) going down. Savige finished 37 and Spiteri scored an unbeaten half century (58) in this return, Moe winning by 8 wickets (2/120) in just 14 overs (RR: 8.6). Farley took the only wicket from the mostly young Tigers bowlers, White with a catch & a run out.
🏏 Raiders def Centrals to stay in the top 2. They now both sit joint top on 56 points, Imperials & Moe tied on 54pts. The last round sees the top 4 play the bottom 4 so if the higher teams all win, so would need
🏏 Premier C Grade ⚫️⚪️ Glengarry v Moe 🦁
Moe have officially qualified for finals with their victory at Glengarry. The home side batted 33.3 overs for just 44 runs on the board. Gerard Mowat scored most of them with 23, extras next highest with 7. Luke Whitney in his first game for Moe did the most damage with 4/11, taking a combined 6/13 with Ronnie Whitney (2/2). A few strong performances from our juniors with Tyler Duff taking 2/17 from 8 overs, Noah Keltie (1/6) taking his first senior wicket & Brady Cake finishing with an extremely economical 0/4 from 8 overs. Craig Veenman bowled a wicket maiden to move one closer to 300 club wickets (296) & Biggins had 0/1 from 2. Moe chased the runs down in just 15 overs. The Whitney’s opened, Luke dismissed for 6. Ronnie (18) batted through with juniors Cake (9) & Keltie (9*). Moe 2/52.
🏏 Possibly a final round & semi final repeat weekend with Ex-Students (1st) facing Mirboo North (4th) and Toongabbie (2nd) hosting Moe (3rd). If Moe win, they’ll host Toongabbie in a semi final. If Moe lose and Mirboo North win, the Lions will face Ex-Students in the semi final. If Moe & Mirboo North both lose, it will be a direct repeat of next weekend’s matches a week later.
