A Grade 210 defeated Galston-Glenorie 140 – after a narrow loss last week in the T20 against Glenorie, we were keen to avenge today and we got off to the perfect start, JP winning the toss and electing to bat.

After suffering from car troubles en route to the ground, Phil “Doctor” Wurth joined James “Jamakin” Makin late at the crease, much to the disgust of the umpires and the Glenorie team. They were even more disgusted when Doctor briskly walked to the crease and then dispatched the first ball for 4.

Unfortunately the highlights ended at that point for Doctor. Despite commenting “I’m seeing it like beach balls”, he was knocked over very early. Jamakin, Josh “Yoyo” Mathias and Alex “Figjam” Robertson swiftly joined him in the pavilion and the WPHCCC boys were in desperate trouble at 4/15.

Ashane “Ashane” DeSilva and Michael “Lichaaa” Richards were tasked with the rebuilding task, and very quickly the tables turned. Putting the bad balls away and dispatching the import spinner back over his head for multiple boundaries, we made it to 4/70 at drinks and the Doctor was already celebrating a win.

Lichaaa and Ashane went not long after drinks for 41 and 65 respectively after a 98 run partnership together. They had built a platform for the tail to unleash some big hitting. Tim “Buckets” Scholar (32), Dan “Cardigan” Costigan (35) and Bailey “Bails” Miedler (24) closed the innings in style and we reached an incredible total of 210 – a huge effort from the depths of despair.

We continued the momentum with the ball with great opening spells from Buckets and Bails, immediately applying the pressure. Runs were hard to come by, made even harder with a brilliant spell from Jackson “Selma” Preedy who bagged three wickets for the day – Marge is very proud.

Rocketing through the last couple of overs to beat the light, Glenorie limped to 130 odd giving WPHCCC a comfortable victory – just as Doctor had predicted just three hours earlier.

MVP = Ashane
Joker = Doctor

A2 Grade 4/113 defeated St Colah 7/110 – welcome to A2’s, a team so high up there in performance, we are the self confessed boner of cricket teams. St Ives and Mt Colah knew this, and combined clubs to try and beat us.

After 6 months of planning and preparation, all that was thrown out the window when Snumpty lost another toss – $2. We bowled, with Tis ‘I Can Also Get Adults Out’ Mistry getting us off to a great start, with a fiery opening spell that was as fast as a Kaity Herzog proposal rejection.

At the other end, Cambo ‘No Man Bun Here’ McBrien used the legside dot to perfection, to show great eco. After attempting some well executed full finger bungers, Fernie ‘Dad Took More Poles Than Me Today’ Meikle took a key wicket, in what was a really even bowling performance. Restricting St Colah to 110 off 30 overs was a great effort, with Snumpty ‘Body Like Someone Who’s Bowled 2,000 Overs’ Smyth taking 3, Tis 2 and Fernie 1.

In a proud Rob and Kerrie-Ann moment, a Cambo-LMac run out stood out. Mitchell ‘Blowy’ Blow bowled an economical spell too, which continued the pressure on the toss winners.

Chasing 111, and we opted to open with Volc ‘I Wear Jeans To Cricket’ Cano as our night watchman. He saw off enough deliveries to ensure that L ‘Mc’ Brien and Pear ‘Mayo’ Partridge put on an entertaining 2nd wicket partnership, which gave us control. Pear hit a run a ball 37, and LMac 31. Jimmy ‘Mc’ Brien and Fat ‘Catch This Keeper’ Connell saw us home by 6 wickets, with 8 overs to spare.

A great first up team win. Cambo took on the fines role, and needs to take more control when other teams interrupt our fines session. It’s important.

PS We hope you’re ok Gandis.

B1 Blue (Rick) 6/165 lost to St Ives 5/211 – a disappointing result for our first game. Bowling first we started well with Peter Flook taking a wicket in the first over. But St Ives dug in and rode their luck, and with a combination of a treacherously horrible Dural Park, streaky shots and some of us fielding like old ladies, they amassed 211 which we still felt was quite gettable given our deep batting order. Peter Flook (2-33) and Calvin Breytenbach bowled well but without much luck, and skipper Rick Turner put in an early nomination for ‘Best Turner’ with 2-33 off his seven overs.

Confident that we could chase the big total, and motivated by not letting their Dad one-up them, Turner brothers Zac and Alex put on a terrific opening partnership, seeing us through to the break with a solid foundation before it was eventually ended on 87. Alex (40 with four 4s and a hyooge 6) and Zac (45 with three 4s) gave us a sign of good things to come with some solid play and at times exciting cricket.

Young gun and excitement machine Cooper Goddard (41 no with two 4s and a massive 6) and Tom Hando (22 with three 4s) came in with a late flourish which looked like it would bring the house down, but to their credit St Ives bowled tight and fielded well and just had too many runs.

Still, some valuable lessons learned for our WPHCCC boys and now that the first hit-out is out of the way we’ll expect some big things and big wins from this exciting team in the coming weeks!

B1 Red (Gunny) 4/177 defeated Glenorie 120 – as the youngest Captain in the club’s history, Michael Gunn started his Captaincy debut strongly with an excellent toss win and chose to bat. Like a good Captain, Gunns put himself at the top of the order and gave us a solid start alongside Pon.

Unfortunately, Pon got hungry and snatched at a full toss so he could return to the pavilion and enjoy his finger buns. This brought Matt Watts to the crease who lulled Glenorie into a false sense of security by taking 21 balls to get off the mark, before compiling an excellent 79*. Matt was supported by Brent (31) and Ray (22*), giving us a good total of 4/177 but we knew we’d have to bowl well with the fast Les Shore outfield.

Our opening bowlers failed to make a breakthrough and it was once again left to Ben Miekle to carry the rest of the attack. Four balls into his spell, Papa Mieks had two wickets and finished with 3/29 from his spell, turning the innings in our favour.

We are looking forward to the two-dayers, where Ben can bowl from one end the entire innings. Semonn bowled with serious heat and bullied Glenorie’s tail, picking up 3/8 to seal victory for the Reds.

B2 112 lost to Castle Hill 1/114 – we won the toss and elected to bat on a lumpy looking Gilroy. Eric Junkkari (17) and Michael McGregor (18) got us going with a solid start before both batsmen were dismissed in quick succession.

Wickets were given away cheaply throughout the innings with Phil Hayes (26) showing some resistance in the middle order and Rob Knapman (21) chipping in at the tail.

Defending 112 we needed to keep the bowling tight. Ryan Loveridge bowled well in his opening spell and was unlucky not to pick up a wicket on his first ball. Matt Digby came on first change and made the batsmen earn their runs. Eric Junkkari leaked just 4 runs from his 4 overs.

With only 112 on the board and taking just 1 wicket the Opposition passed our total in the 32nd over.

A tough day at the office for the first game of the season.

C1 143 drew with Castle Hill 6/131 – Captain Wortho won the toss against Castle Hill and decided to bat on what can be said a two toned pitch, one end takes spin and grips into the wicket the other almost dead not much carry through.

Napier (Travis head “should be all formats captain) & Richard Hughes opened the batting and we’re playing cautiously, but ticking the scoreboard over, Hughesy (7) succumbed to lbw, not much longer was Napier (16) runout by a rocket arm in the field.

Enter Arun Kumar (27) & Pavan Cherupalli (32) playing with intent but very respectful in keeping wickets for drinks, played some great shots and build upon a decent total. It must be said however Jonty Rhodes was controlling the leg side boundary with aplomb stopping probably 20-25 runs saved for Castle hill. Drinks break didn’t help

Arjun caught out early soon after, Aseem Goswami (18) looks a very handy all-rounder playing some gorgeous cover drives, sharing with Pavan a quick fire 24 in 4 overs upping the run rate. Pavan fell to a run out also (4 in total), from here we lost quick wickets 6-45, only some late order hitting from Wortho (16) got us to 143.

Bowling we got off to a great start with Sam Hando (1-13 off 5) & Aseem Goswami (0-20 off 3) bowling beautifully in tandem building pressure, with Sam rewarded with an absolute peach to find an edge to Keeper Wortho,

Napier (2-13 off 7 with 4 maidens) was the perfect follow up with some beautiful lines and out foxing the Castle hill batsman, ably supported with Raunak Sethi (0-10), and Arjun Kumar (0-14).

Asees Rajput (2-23 off 7) was unlucky bowling some lovely flight and guile to bamboozle their batsmen, and also Pavan Cherupalli (1-27 off 7) bowled with some exquisite flight and was also unlucky troubling their batsmen as well. Unfortunately the match ended in a draw whereby even by bowling spin, both sides player safety was brought into question with bad light crueling in what could of been a fantastic finish.

Some very encouraging early signs from all my players looking forward to the season ahead.

C2 Blue (Fieds) 4/174 defeated Normanhurst 9/102 – a dominant performance today from the mighty C2 Blues. We won the toss, batted, and agreed to reduce the overs to 33 a-side, to avoid a possible bad-light call in case things turned sour. We batted and showed urgency from the first over. The running between wickets of veteran Mick Barry (50) and youngster Dan Schwartzel (59) kept us all on edge – in fact they troubled themselves more than the bowling did, as they got us off to an excellent start before Mick fell with the score at 84 in the 19^th over.

Dan upped the run rate with Varun Ravindran (19), before Ollie Linschoten closed out the innings with a brisk 18 no, to see us post a formidable 174.

Varu (2/10) and Jack Barry opened the bowling and delivered quick & straight, causing the Normo top order all sorts of problems. Assisted by a couple of run outs to the Chidge (of the Alex variety) we broke Normo’s back to have them 5/9 in the 10^th over. It was one of those days when we threw the ball to a new bowler and they took a wicket first up.

We raced through the overs to ensure we didn’t come unstuck with long shadows falling across Normanhurst Oval. At the same time we were able to use 8 bowlers, so everyone enjoyed contributing for a team that looks like having a strong season.

C2 Red (Indranil) 122 lost to Glenorie 125 – first match of the main season, we lost the toss and were put in to bat. Not a bad outcome though. Bowlers started well but Glenorie openers decided to pinch hit from the start. It was a ploy which made sense later on because apart from first few batters, Glenorie’s batting line-up was pretty thin.

Amit Sen (1/30) got the first opener in the second over and Ben Kinchington (1/24) bowled some great deliveries but the Glenorie batters were playing cross batted shots which stuck. Glenorie had an unrated player who was the opener and scored 30 before retiring.

The changeup bowlers Nick Duck (1/7) got a wicket off the first ball and bowled tight line and length. Shankar Ravi (1/30) bowled out his spell and batters were finding it difficult to play him. Young Jude Boyle (3/26) was the pick of the bowlers once he settled down into his line.

Anirudh Kakulapati (2/8) who was filling-in from B2s cleaned-up the tail. From a pretty good start from Glenorie to wrapping up for 125 was a good outcome for us and was a below par score on a smallish Greenup Park.

Our turn to bat and it seemed the cobwebs were still hanging there. Graham (0) and Indranil (13) opened and Graham fell to an uppish drive early on to covers. Indranil started playing with some intent and played couple of good shots but a bit unlucky to get given caught. Apparently the ball grazed midway on his forearm above his wrist but the umpire thought otherwise.

The middle order then packed in due to poor shot selection early on and we were teetering at 5/20 in 7 overs. Everyone wase a bit shocked. Middle order with Jude (10) and Ben Dunkerley (10) showed some grit and played sensibly to steady the ship a little bit. When Jude and Ben departed we were 7/42 in the 16th over staring down a big loss.

Ben Kinchington (30) and Nick Duck (27) showed the top order how cricket should be played. They played maturely and didn’t panic and swiftly built up a partnership. They kept rotating the strike and punished the bad balls. We were 7/101 in 28 overs with a run a ball to get. By this time Glenorie were in panic.

Unfortunately Ben and Nick fell shortly after with 15 to get in the last two with the last pair in. Amit Sen (11) tried with couple of shots to the boundary but our last wicket fell on the last ball with 4 to win.

We did well to get up to a close finish from the early debacle and the team can take a leaf or two out of the juniors’ books with the way they played in the middle.

Hoping to turn things around from the next round. The team looks good in the bowling and fielding department, batting needs to polish up.

C3 128 lost to Hornsby 5/131 – heading out to bat (even though we lost the toss), our experienced campaigners Ross Anderson and Ian Paterson reunited to get us off to a steady start. Ross, looking to notch up his 8000th run for the Club, started in magnificent fashion with a majestic cut for four off his first ball of the season!

A great sign of things to come! Unfortunately Ross was playing a bit of a lone hand at the start and we lost regular wickets before Rosco fell for an elegant 30, agonisingly 2 runs short of his 8000 (next week Mate!).

Buzz and John Rose put on a bit of a partnership, however wickets kept falling and we ended up all out 128 (Buzz 48).

The bowling started with Rowan Dickinson showing us real pace and control and some solid overs from all the bowlers used.

Best on the day was Paul Vink (2/34), with Riley Paton, Connor Hindmarch and Will Harvey all chipping in with a wicket.

Too few runs to defend today, but some really promising signs of a top bunch of players that will ensure plenty of points in the win column in matches to come.

D1 5/255 defeated Galston-Glenorie 174 – we won toss and elected to bat first, after succumbing to an early wicket. Cameron and Ian held a dominant partnership, making it extremely difficult for Glenorie to chase, with Cameron retiring after knocking a fabulous 114 and Ian collecting 66 runs. This was our 1^st ton of the season and our 475^th in our history. WPH went on to make 255 runs, with some quick runs from Connor and Steve at the end.

The bowling got off to a great start with Josh and Amith smashing the stumps for the first 4 wickets in successive overs. Some tight fielding slowed the run rate down, and secured some wickets. The final partnership continued for multiple overs, until Siby hit the stumps to secure an easy win for WPH.

A great batting and bowling performance from WPH saw the first victory for the season, and a great way to start the competition.

D2 163 lost to Thornleigh – 178 we won the toss and elected to bat at Holland Reserve. This was a 35 over per team match.

Luke Christensen played a smart beginning with Thiru Pukazthenthi. Unfortunately Thiru received a very good inswinger which took his off stump. We were 1 for 7 in the first over. Luke was run out in the 13th over with a bit of a mix-up in the middle but hit 22 valuable runs.

Captain Mike came in and hit 19 runs but got run out trying to force the run rate. We were 3 for 65 after 17 overs. Ian Williams managed to hit 10 runs before getting a LBW while Vishaal Nathan hit 8 runs before being bowled. Lakshya Rao came in for a cameo as number 7 batter and hit 49 runs not out. At over 25 we were 5 for 106 runs.

The tail hit a further 57 runs which included 18 from Agniva Chakaborthy. Our innings ended after 35 overs with WPHC being 7 for 163. This was a reasonable score with good contributions from all our players.

Thornleigh sent in their openers at 3.10 pm. They are quite strong hitters. Agniva managed to snag a wicket in their 5th over with Parin Pillamarri taking a catch in the gully. So Thornleigh were 1 for 23. Nirav Desai came in to bowl as our second bowler.

Captain Mike took a sensational sizzling catch at long off from Nirav’s bowling to have Thornleigh 2 for 45 in the 8th over. Lakshya Rao took 3 wickets for 22 runs in his 7 overs including being on a hat trick at one stage. Ian Williams also took a wicket. At the end of the 32nd over Thornleigh were 7 for 157. They hit the required winning runs in the 33rd over.

We certainly had Thornleigh worried in this match. They did not expect us to hit as many runs as we did. We probably let ourselves down by bowling too many leg side balls plus a far number of balls that were short.

If we can get better discipline into our bowling then we should present a formidable challenge in the coming rounds.