Sydenham, St Albans well ahead on first innings

Press, 15 February 1982, Page 28

Sydenham, St Albans well ahead on first innings

Sydenham and St Albans, two clubs which have struggled to make much impact on the A.N.Z. Bank cricket championship this season, achieved commanding positions over higherranked opponents when the ninth round began on. Saturday.' ' • The Sydenham mediumpaced bowlers. Bob Carter and Stu Simpson, combined to have High School Old Boys out before • lunch for a meagre 75 runs. Then, with Kevin Congdon providing a fine example, Sydenham reached its highest total of the summer to lead by 166 runs.

The pattern of the match at Hagley 1 was quite different. St Albans had early batting problems before ; Lyn Sparks. Les Smi,th. and Andy Nuttall were the principal figures in a fine recovery. It was then East ChristchurchShirley’s turn to lose early wickets, and the St Allans bowlers, Les . Watson ' and Sparks, ensured that there was no revival. St Albahs--leads by 159 runs on the first innings. Lancaster Park is well poised to consolidate its competition lead, and perhaps clinch the title with one round remaining. A hardhitting 85 by its captain, Dave Dempsey, has Park 37 runs ahead of Riccarton with, if Dempsey chooses to bat on, three wickets left.

The second-placed Burn-side-West Christchurch-Uni-versity is not so happily placed. Its opponent, Old Collegians. needs only three more runs, with three wickets in hand, to have first innings points. Scores.— .<■' - . Riccarton 134 met Lancaster Park 171/7. St Albans 240 met EastShirley 81 and 1/0. Old Boys 75 met Sydenham 241.

Burnside-West 147 met Old Collegians 145/7. Congdon was the highest individual scorer with 89. Dempsey and Sparks were the only other batsmen to exceed a half-century. Carter and Simpson gained five Old Boys wickets each, and Watson took five for St Albans. Dempsey’s day The day at Hagley 3 went well for the Lancaster Park captain. Dave .Dempsey, .from the time that he won the toss and sent Riccarton in to bat. By stumps Dempsey had done most to give his side a Useful first innings advantage.' .< . But it- was David Trist who held centre stage for much of the morning. Conserving energy by using a short run. Trist had an exceptionally fine .opening spell of 1$ . overs during, which he conceded just eighti-Xruns J and '" claimed two wickets; Although David Stead and Lindsay Thorn .prevented any further collapse, they were never able to wrQst thejnitiatiye from the Park". bpwjers.’ However. : Peter. . Stubbings brought some authority, : ;to, the Riccarton inhin/s; hitting six boundaries and'/ reaching 5 .40 iff- little more than an hour. At 116 for four Riccarton had promise of a sizeable total, it was then that the second recession set in. two wickets falling at that total. Then, from 134 for six, the lower order fell apart and

Riccarton was dismissed without further addition. Dempsey shared in Riccarton's woes with two cheap wickets, and Wayne Wilson also finished with fine figures. Overall. Riccarton had managed just a fraction more than two runs an over. The tempo of the match was lifted when Park, and particularly Dempsey, batted. Dempsey was in a typically pugnacious mood, hammering’ four fours from Glen Bateman's third over, and continuing to be especially severe on Bateman. Dempsey reched his half-century in almost even time and his 85 had one six and . 14 fours in a stay of 97 minutes. It must, have been most discouraging for Riccarton that Dempsey could display such command in contrast 'to -.jhe struggles of all other batsmen throughout the day. Dempsey eventually, became one of Stead's four victims, but not-before he had--given Park a marked ascendancy. Batsmen struggle Useful knocks by Graeme Sercombe, Steve Sansom, and Geoff Wright seemed to have Old Collegians. away ori ah easy ride to pass Burnside-West's modest first innings .total, but by the end of the day 5 -Collegians;. were sweating a little; still two runs short of West, and with seven wickets down. The tyest bowlers to check the advance-towards the. end were Tony Farrant. with his lively mediutn-pacers, L and John Mitchell, with his bustling offspin. These two might have had Collegians perspiring even more

freelv. for two catches were .dropped in the last 10 minutes. both Derek Templeton and Mike Henderson being lucky to survive.

Sercombe had Collegians off to a good start with 21 of the 30-run opening partnership. Sansom fought well for 117 minutes, playing some sweet cut shots at times: and Wright had six wellstruck fours in his 37.

West began the dav in unconvincing fashion. Five wickets went for only 57 before 'Peter Wallace and John Smith steadied the innings. These two made a stand of 49 runs in 43 minutes and. later, there was a very useful partnership of 29 between the last pair. Steve Bateman and Paul Healey. Annoyingly for West, both partnerships were broken when batsmen who looked set for higher things were run out. There was something in the pitch for the seamers who could hit the right length. Robert Wilson looked dangerous for Collegians in. his short spells, although he had only limited success. and the off-spinner, Vaughan Brown, took the bowling honours. Lindsay Forde bowled tidily, getting a few to Jiff, and'Bill Lawrence, with a nice action, was. very useful For West, the whippy Healey removed Collegians first three batsmen, but in the end it was Farrant and Mitchell who applied the pressure. Old Boys collapse High School Old Boys battled dismally on am unusually green pitch at Sydenham Park. The steady Sydenham medium-paced attack of Bob Carter ana Stu Simpson dismissed the opposition for,a miserable 75. ■

Although the pitch was not easy. Old Boys batted badly; only Cran Bull, with 25. making any impression on the bowling. Both Simpson and Carter bowled well, keeping a good line and length, and they were supported well by the field.

With Old Boys dismissed shortly before lunch, Sydenham had the whole afternoon’ to drive home the advantage and, withKevin Congdon in good form. Sydenham finished the day 166 runs ahead. Congdon battled for 194 minutes for his 89 runs and it was an innings of great value to

his side. He batted sensiblv and well and laid the foundation for his side’s good score, being sixth out with the score at 170. Simpson completed a fine double for the day to make 36 not out to add to his five wickets. The Old Boys attack was no more than steady and although wickets were picked up the bowlers were unable to make up the ground lost by the batsmen. East routed St Albans established an iron grip on its match against EastShirley by taking nine wickets in the final period of play and ensuring that East had to follow on. The match started unusually: St Albans scored at better than a run a minute on the fast outfield at Hagley one. but East was equally satisfied as it secured wickets regularly. At 139 for seven, the game was evenly balanced. ... z . But the pendulum .swung sharply in favour of St Albans when its last three wickets added an invaluable 101 runs. .. .L Lyn Sparks capitalised on the solid recovery started by I£s Smith and Mark Burtt and he found sturdy support in Ross McNally and Andrew Nuttall. Then Nuttall and Les Watson added 24 for the last wicket. Craig Thiele and Garry Hooper, both back in the EastShirley side after missing several '.rounds through injury, claimed four wickets each arid Hooper was especially dangerous. cutting the ball back sharply and extracting some lift. At 30 for one at tea. EasU Shirley could not have foreseen the disaster which was to come. It was dismissed for 81, only Ray Jones batting with conviction for 23. Peter Grigg, who had held five catches for East behind the wicket, and Tony Gray added 18 for the ninth wicket and that equalled the best partnership. The steady medium-pace bowler. Les Watson, rocked EastShirley with five wickets and Sparks completed a fine double with four for 19 off 13 overs. The fieldsmen snapped up all chances and pressed the batsmen into committing false shots. ■lt will need a much more dedicated batting effort from East next Saturday if the match is not to have an early finish.