T20 Match Reports

1^st Grade (JP) 4/96 defeated Kissing Point 85 – in a day full of elite sporting fixtures the highlight was at Mt Ku-ring-gai oval which was the venue for the opening game of the season against Kissing Point.

Newly appointed skipper JP passed his first test with flying colours with a toss win, electing to bat on a greasy spring afternoon.

The opening partnership of Philemon and Debutant Partridge was a steady 40 before Philemon (19) continued on from last season, pitching one to long on. Runs were hard seemed hard come by in the wet conditions before Ashane MAAAATTEEE got things ticking over with a run a ball 29 before rain halted proceedings.

Nobody wanted to resume things except for the umpire who took one last drag and said “aight let’s get back out there fellas”

With 2 overs lost with the delay we had one over left and finished with a competitive 96.

Temperature dropped sub zero thanks to the high altitude and Phil was wearing every item of clothing he could find in his bag to compensate.

Buckets and Taaawwwwwiiiisstt started us off with some real venom, before our first wicket came from a very unlikely and very annoying Philemon.

JP led the way with some real economical bowling (2/2) bowling in partnership with bowling all rounder Robbo who claimed 3 scalps. We won’t stop hearing about that for weeks to come. The game seemed to be getting away from the boys before what is being labelled early as “catch of the season” from Preeds.

Running backwards he dove full stretch to remove their dangerous batsmen.

From then on the “clamps” were on and the boys from “last year didn’t happen” kicked off their season with a 18 run win.

Special mention to Mieks for coming along to support the boys even in the moist conditions.

2^nd Grade Blue (Rick) 6/134 lost to Galston-Glenorie 9/141 – a good first hit-out for the boys in Blue as we got on a surprisingly dry deck at Gilroy College. The main aim of the day was to get everyone involved and shake off the rust and cobwebs, and our stand-in skipper Julian Raffel did the right thing by winning the toss and sending Castle Hill into bowl.

A run-out by in the first over got us off to a good start, but then Castle Hill consolidated and a combination of dropped catches, an unusual field that wasn’t quite an oval (short in some places and long in others) and rusty bowling allowed Castle Hill to accumulate a total of 9-141.

We bowled well with wickets shared all around with Peter Flook (1-18) and Calvin Breytenbach (2-21) bowling with fire at the start and end and were both particularly good. Prat Datar (1-22) bamboozled the opposition with his in-swing, Cooper Goddard (1-19) showed some fire in his first outing, Tim Leyshon (1-28) looped and hooped, and Allan Raffel (1-4) hooped and looped, with Cam McBrien also unlucky not to get a wicket.

A great bowling effort despite some dropped catches with all bowlers unlucky not to have more wickets, however the field was greasy and Castle Hill rode their luck with a couple of batsmen doing well and Sundries (29 no) also making a great contribution.

Going into bat with a constant drizzle of rain, Zac Turner held an end and allowed Raghu Chary (25 including 5 fours) to hit out and show some strong intent, dancing down the pitch to hit some great shots over the bowler showing great early season form.

Then Cooper Goddard (45 with five fours and a six) and Ruben Alexander (41 with two fours and three sixes) came together and put on a terrific partnership of 82 in only 7 overs, a sensational effort.

Ruben lashed out at will and hit some terrific pull-shots to the longest boundary showing complete disdain for field placings and good bowling, and Cooper showed exciting intensity for such a young player with some classy drives and pullshots and clever rotation. Despite this incredible partnership, we ran out of overs and finished just short of Castle Hill at 6-134.

But it was a good first hit-out with every individual getting involved and making a contribution which was the aim of the day. Looking forward to next week to again getting everyone involved and hopefully clearer skies and a solid win!

2^nd Grade Red (Napper) 5/129 lost to Normanhurst-Warrawee 4/180 – despite the wet weather over the last couple of days, Mount Kuring-Gai was in good nick. Naps got the season under way in the usual fashion by losing the toss. We were sent out into the field. The Normo openers came out with intent. They put on 75 runs in the first 6 overs.

Matt Digby (1/27) got the breakthrough, with Brent Larkham taking a great diving catch in the deep. Diggers returned the favour holding on to a diving catch at Square leg from Brent’s bowling. Matt Watts bowled a great spell taking 1/17 and slowing down the run rate.

Ray Khamis came out to the crease looking to make an immediate dent in the total. He was only out in the middle for 5 balls, but in true Ray style, it was eventful. The sequence was 4. 2, 6 then on the 5th ball there was a sharp ‘snap’. As Ray went to send another one over the fence his bat split from toe to handle with half of his bat landing at square leg, while he was caught out at point!

Ray collected his pieces and walked from the field. Now Ray must have seen it coming, because before he went out to bat, he pulled out a brand new bat and waved it around. He then put it away for safe keeping until he had knocked it in and used it in the nets.

Ian Paterson (30) showed the young’uns how it’s done, working the ball around to all parts of the ground. Ian was well supported by Brent Larkham (29), Matt Watts (23*) and Aaron Hawkins (18*).

We may not have got the result we were after, but it was great to be back out there!!

3^rd Grade Blue (Tarun) Vs Bye – an annoying way to start the season with a Bye but we backup again next week for our season start.

3^rd Grade Red (Buzz) 6/148 defeated Galston 125 – on a drizzly day at Les Shore we started well by winning the toss and batting first.

Napier and Nandu opened and showed great form with Napier retiring on 44 to give others a bat and Nandu open his shoulders to smash 48 ncluding two big sixes. Waris was the best of the remaining batsmen compiling a well made 31* to take our team score to a respectable 148 after our 20 overs.

Sam Hando and Raunak Sethi kicked off our bowling with some good quick stuff, Sam grabbing the breakthrough in his first over. We used 10 bowlers and picked up wickets consistently, the best spell came from Arjun Kumar who had the opposition tied in knots to take 2-8. Napier picked up two with Manu, Rommel and Buzz one apiece to bowl Glenorie out for 125.

A great first hit out with everyone dusting of the cobwebs.

4^th Grade Blue (Fieds) 4/157 defeated Castle Hill Gold 7/86 – this wasn’t the September weather we expected, but we had no choice but to pretend it was summer and get stuck into another great year of West Penno cricket.

We won the toss and batted, and after some early adjustment to the conditions, Daniel Schwartzel (19) and Dylan Bish (30) started to assert some authority by adding 32 runs in the first 7 overs (this, after the early loss of someone who will go nameless to a shot that can best be described as an abomination). Anyway, following Daniel’s dismissal, Will Harvey entered and turned the game on its head. He muscled the attack to all parts of Campbell Park, smacking 63 including reaching his 50 in 24 balls. His innings included 11 x 4s & 2 x 6s. Jack Barry (21 no) and Riley Paton (7no) finished off things nicely, and we managed a very handy 4/157 at the close.

Our turn in the field, and we were able to put the vice on Castle Hill early, as Daniel Schwartzel only allowed 2 runs off his first 2 overs. Dylan Bish followed him up and was also effective with 1/1 off 2. The spinners Olly Linschoten (1/9) and Will Harvey (1/10) putting a dent in their middle order and the game was comfortably beyond doubt. Jack Barry bowled a quick spell (1/1) as the gloom closed in and his dad, Mike, bowling his 1^st over for many years snared 2 poles to finish the match in style.

A great start, lads!

4^th Grade Red (Indranil) 9/94 lost to Berowra 7/100 – starting the season with weather not looking promising and a long drive to the Brooklyn Diary oval, something seemed something in the making. With  luck on toss there was no hesitation to bat first up.

Indranil and Ben Kinchington opened the batting and played steadily in the first 4 overs. Then wickets started to fall in regular intervals and getting runs was difficult on such a slow outfield. After the first 10 overs, we put on 3/40 and we knew we had to up our scoring rate.

With not many boundaries on offer, having fresh legs helped as there was some good running between the wickets and finished on 9/94 after the allocated 20 overs. Batsmen who spent some time in the middle were Ben Kinchington 17, Nicholas Duck 16, Pavan 12, Graham 12 and Indranil 11.

The intent while bowling was to give short spells to all who wanted to have a bowl, but with light drizzle on some of the seasoned bowlers wanted a break. We had Sreeni and Vinod open the bowling and in that spell were unlucky not to get wickets. Berowra quickly reached in the first 8 overs to 0/37. After introducing slow bowling options, we got the first break-through through Asees and he capitalised by taking out the Berowra Captain in the same over. We continued to keep the pressure on the opposition taking regular wickets with some fine catching in the outfield and a good stumping by the keeper off Pavan’s bowling.

In the last over Berowra needed 9 runs and we continued to encourage our young Jude Boyle to bowl as in his previous over he got a wicket giving just 1 run. Berowra had some big hitters at the end and they managed 2 sixes in the last over finishing the game with 2 balls to spare. It was a close game and a good one for all to have a go. Bowlers amongst the wickets were Asees 2/14, Pavan Cheruppali 3/24, Ben 1/14, Jude 1/15.

A big call out to Pavan and Asees to fill in and Amitava Sen who could not take the field as nursing a back injury but taking on umpiring duties and helping out transporting 2 junior boys to the game.

5^th Grade Blue (Gautam) 5/96 lost to Berowra 4/118 – the first game of the season didn’t start well with us losing the toss and Berowra putting us in to bowl, but some good lines by both Cameron and Connor saw their score held down for the first few overs. However with the lack of wickets falling, Berowra went on to make 118, with Connor taking 2-15, Roger with 1-18 and Amith with 1-10.

Our batting got off nicely with Mitch and Ian scoring runs early to have our run rate progressing on target. But with a lack of runs scored during the middle overs, chasing their target was always going to be tough. Rob top scored with 21* followed by several contributions from others. In the end the Berowra total was a bit too out of reach.

A good game to get the rust off and hopefully a better performance to come during the regular season.

5^th Grade Red (Captain Mike) 2/106 lost to Thornleigh 2/108 – we lost the toss and were sent into bat on John Purchase Oval. It basically drizzled all through the match but increased when we were bowling. Luke Christensen hit a very good 49 with Ian Williams not out for 30. We lost wickets at 30 and 79 runs and there were 13 sundries after 20 overs. Thornleigh managed to get the required runs in 15 overs with their opener hitting 63 with some power hitting.

Our batting was quite good but our bowling was very inconsistent and quite short at times. Steve Q and Agriva Chakaborthy took a wicket a piece. We will need to work on our bowling and getting some practice will stand us in good stead.