Moe vs Mirboo North
Moe Innings
Moe won the toss and elected to bat. Max Woodall 2/40 (10) dismissed both Moe openers, Rob Phoenix (9) & Jesse Pheeney (5) to reduce the hosts to 2/20. The openers of previous seasons, Noah Kane (20) & Riley Baldi (40) added 60 for the 3rd wicket before both fell with the score on 80 to Lawrey & Banks respectively. Lawrey had his second wicket when Andrew Philip (0) picked out Banks in the field. Banks then took his second (Grant 4) and Moe were 6/92, having lost 4/12.
Paddy Spiteri (36) made the majority of the 45 run 7th wicket stand paired with the returning Trent Baldi. Baldi (34) & Aaron Johnstone (17) put on 34 for the 8th wicket before the latter became Lawrey’s 3rd scalp. Clint Taylor (10) & Robert Blunt (1*) saw Moe to 10/192, with Taylor dismissed on the second last ball of the allotted overs.
Lawrey finished with 3/37 (10) whilst Hollis (2/18), Banks (2/25) and Woodall (2/40) took multiple wickets. Heath (1/32) got one scalp. Thomas took the only wicket before rain abandoned the two day game but was kept wicketless here (0/36 off 10).
Mirboo North Innings
Clint Taylor & Aaron Johnstone opened the bowling and each snared an opening batter (Snell 9, Rogers 2) to have the visitors 2/9. Hollis was given a life, dropped in Robert Blunt’s opening over at about 2/35. In his 3rd and final over of his first spell (1/7 off 3), Blunt picked up the wicket of Ben Heath for 6, with an edge onto the batsman’s pad somehow ballooning to Pheeney at gully. Shortly after, Rob Phoenix had Hollis caught and bowled for 31 to make it 4/55.
Dom Davis & Will Cheatley faced Phoenix & Grant for the majority of their 60 run stand. Phoenix was supremely economical with 1/18 from his 10 overs. Davis survived an edge off Phoenix with gully unmoved as the ball sailed past closely. Cheatley survived a big stumping appeal when in the 20’s and a dropped catch in the 30’s, so Moe definitely had their chances, but hadn’t taken them. Could the visitors make them pay? Blunt, who had put down the Cheatley chance, tried to atone for the error with the breakthrough of Davis (25) at 5/115. Moe’s defensive field set ups, did achieve the goal of restricting boundaries, but welcomed the Tigers to get easy ones and twos to accumulate towards the target, if they played it smartly. The visitors did just that, consistently getting the 4-5 runs an over required for the majority of the second half of the chase. Woodall (9 off 15) & Barnes (2 off 8.) stuck around in 34 & 22 run pairings respectively with Cheatley facing the majority of deliveries. Woodall was Pat Spiteri’s 100th club wicket for Moe whilst Barnes fell lbw to Grant.
Dale Banks (10* off 25) joined the match winner Cheatley (87* off 82 balls) to achieve the last 22 runs with 2 overs to spare. Phoenix (1/18 off 10) was Moe’s best bowler against his former side, whilst Blunt was the only multiple wicket taker. All bowlers took a wicket in a shared effort that just fell short.
