Cricket Comfortable win to St Albans

Press, 28 March 1988, Page 22

Cricket Comfortable win to St Albans

St Albans completed' its successful defence of ' the Canterbury first grade cricket championship when it beat its closest' rival. Lancaster Park, comfortably on the first innings a-t Ensors ’Road on Saturday.' That result enabled St Albans to win the Trust Bank Trophy by a margin of 10 competition points. ’ Riccartpn lifted itself from sixth into third position by easily | accounting for East Christchurch-Shirley at Burwood Park. It was East's first .defeat; since Christmas. First innings points against Old CoHegians at Burnside Park were enough for Burn-side-West .Christchurch-L'ni-versity to finish fourth over all: i Marist had a similar return 1 against Woolston Working Men's Club to. be fifth, and Sydenham’s dramatic outright victory over High School Old Boys enabled it to join East.in sixth placing. Final points: St Albans 97. Lancaster' Park 87, Riccarton 61. Burnside-West 57.5. Marist 53, East-Shirlev 49, Svdenham 49, Old .Boys' 37. Old Collegians .33, Woolston W.M.C. 19. ; ■ ! ■ Results!.—

St Albans 366 beat Lancaster Pdrk 209 on the first innings. | Sydenham TI2 and 263/8 dec. bear Old Boys 147/7 dec. and 224 by four runs. Riccarton 217/9 dec. and 8/0 ■ beat East-Shirley 108 and 114 by 10 wickets. Burnside-West 283/4 dec. and 136/7 dec. beat Old Collegians 247 and 102/5 on ■ the first finnings. Woolston W.M.C. 149 and 242/7 dec. lost to Marist. 189 and 193/8 on the first innings. David Bond, of Old Collegians, t nd Ken Julian, the Sydenham off-spinner, were among .thb outstanding individuals on Saturday. Bond carried his overnight, score of 82 through to 150 not out and then made a swift 47 in his second innings against Burnside-f West. The Woolston opener. Anup, Nathu. whs seven short of his century, hnd lan Cox (Sydenham); Paul Hartland ' (Old Boys)! Rod Latham (Park), Ray Jones (East), and Peter Kennedy (Woolston). exceeded 5). Playing against Old Boys. Julian . tpok seven second innings pickets. Two young quick, bcwlers did .well — Andrew Caddick had nine East 'victims for Riccarton. and I Henry Richards (St Albans), [captured his fiftieth wicket for the season. luke|s last laugh? St Albrins was undoubtedly the team of the season, but Trevor Luke, of Lancaster Park,: was the player of the day when that season ended at Ensors Road-.bn Saturday. Making what' might be trie last of J 162 senior appear-

ances for his club. Luke, in his 137th innings, did; much more than was j expedited of him as Park sought tri emulate lhe massive St Albans first innings total. I Lu) e. promoted to; open when there had been tipe for only One over to complete the first day, capitalised ’ on a couplt of catching fumbles to defy [the. St Albans bowlers for just over .three and! a half hours!. By outlasting five of his jtop-ord'er team-mates. Luke| -achieved his highest senior score of 37. Het thus completed the most j prosperous of his 16 seasops in the top grade. Having already captured 51 wickets, a personal best, his 142 .i]uns (at 20.28). also exceeded his!other aggregates. Lukejs normal place In the batting order was near the tail, but he invariably sold his wickgt dearly, as illustrated by his 70 not outs. ! Socn to leave for an English season with the Cockfosters club in Middlesex. Luke is unsuije of his cricket future in Christchurch. If Luke's tenacity was to be admired, then so. too. was Rod Latham's fine touch in scoping an impressive 59 from! 123 balls, with nine fours) and one six. -Latham scored freely onl the off-side and gave Park hope of approaching the target set by St Albans. However, after Latham was out at 133 there was a steady decline. Henry Richards was always the biggest threat to Park l and he took his total of wickets for the season to 50. while Ben Harris’s equalling of the provincial club catching record was all the more memorable because it was achieved from the bowling of his brother, Chris.

St Albans did not complete its campaign unscathed. Paul Rutleldge injured a finger and passed' the wicket-keeping gloves to Max Bremner; and Mark Priest missed the second day because of his commitment to the President's XT which yesterdayplayed the , Netherlands in Nelson. But the club's longest-serv-ing | senior \ player, Geoff Smith.! appropriately brought the gurtain down on its most successful summer by taking the final catch. EAST OUT-PLAYED

’Consistently accurate bowling Supported by excellent catcHing, and fine ground fielding gave Riccarton a 10ivicket win over East Christ-church-Shirley on the latter's homd ground, Burwood Park. East had lost seven wickets for 67 the previous Saturday in relply to Riccarton's 217 for nine [’declared and the main interest ih the morning was whether the follow-on would be a-voided.

Thanks to a tenth-wicket partnership of 32 from Ray and Tony Gray. East

got within 10 runs, but this achievement only postponed the inevitable. Ray Jones had the distinction of batting throughout the innings and played some fine forcing shots. The rest of the batting was mediocre by comparison. With its professional, MarkRobinson, back in England, East could Only muster 10 batsmen and these showed little fight ■ against the controlled Riccarton attack. A partnership of 45 for th'e second wicket from Howard Morel and’Craig Gibb raiseb their supporters' hopes, blit apart from . another of '37 from. Brendon Murray anil Steve Daly there was little batting of quality. Although] plagued by noball calls | — he had the, chagrin of seeing two of these ’ nq-balls hit the wickets UAndrew Caddick bowled well. He]worked ,up. a good pace and at times made the ba|l Tift ’nastily.: Dean Read, from medium pace, moved the bail into the batsmen to good effect, and it was pleasing t|j watch the leg spinners, David Haftshorn and David Stead, deliver a third of the overs bowled. BURNSIDE IN BONDAGE David Bond might well

have felt tempted to souvenir a piece of the Burnside Park turf after totalling 197 runs for Old Collegians in the match against Burnside-West. The opening batsman and wicket-keeper followed his superb 150 not out in the first innings with a marvellously improvised 47 1 from 38 balls as Collegians launched at a difficult target in the final session., Under pressure from a regular loss of wickets in its second innings, Burnside was in a bad position to make a declaration but finally offered Collegians 25 overs from which to score 173. Bond’s opening assault in partnership with Paul McEwan realised 74 runs from the first 10 overs. When the last 10 overs came to be bowled, Collegians needed precisely the same number ofruns, with three wickets down, including Bond and McEwan. When two wickets ’ fell to consecutive balls from David Farrant, John Morton appealed against the light and, after a lengthy deliberation, the umpires pulled the stumps. Nine overs were left unbowled. [ ; In the morning, Burnside found the only way to stop Bond scoring was to remove all of his colleagues. On 82 starting the day, Bond carried on majestically, 1 unruffled by a continuing frequent change of partners. ’ i : . His century! came up from 167 balls and' he needed only’ another 40 deliveries to reach 150. All but 40 of his runs were in boundaries. , ! Once Bond reached'his 150, the last man, Lindsay Forde, was prompted ’ to fire a big shot: at Steve Hawker, and was bowled. Thirty-six ahead and looking to take command in its. second innings, Burnside slumped to 66 for five and lost the initiative 1 . • ’ CLOSE ENCOUNTER. The season could riot have ended better for Sydenham, which had its first [outright win since October, and for High School Old Boys, honourable in defeat] as the autumn darkness descended at 6.30 p.m. Old Boys were required to score 229 at five an over. They was all out for 224, with two balls of the final over remaining. It was more | assertive cricket than' the first day — 451 runs were scored, compared with 295 — and it held almost theatrical interest until the last over. Sydenham's second innings, resuming at 36 for none, produced a remarkable a score, with eight of the batsman dismissed having a mini-' mum return of 15 and Stuart Simpson, one of the not outs, also in double figures. lan Cox was the best of them with 59, his best senior score. Cox was missed three

times, with ’Stu (Roberts, the southerly i at his back, the chief sufferer. He deserved better figures; but Cox, in spite of I those ’ misdemeanours,’ played many attractive shots. Ross Paterson also impressed with his stroke-makirig, Kevin Congdon, lower ' in the i order, played impressively, Richard Petrie, scoreless for 57 minutes, managed to get going with! a vengeance. Wayne Higgins was his usual assertive self, and Ken! Julian made runs [when they were badly needed. ] Sydenham scored briskly, particularly ] during the prelunch session, 141 runs'in 150 minutes, and the declaration came, in perfect time. The Old Boys bowlers performed well, but the fielding was somewhat sketchy., Chris F]lanagan bowled economically, Andy Nicol found turn in the pitch' and Vance Thompson, for the third time in the two-day games, took a wicket' with his first ball. ] The .Hartland brothers. Blair and Paul, scored 37 off the first seven overs, but Blair was out at 59 and the battle was waged on an even scale thereafter. It was, dur-’ ing the last 20 overs, six and a half an over with five gone, still six with eight to go. Paul Hartland" was in a particularly aggressive mood, chancing his arm here and there, but producing some classic drives. He reached 74 from 58 balls. David Bull and Ross Bayliss ran like Geoff Marsh and David Boon in the one-day internationals, Cran Bull, in spite of a heavy attack of 'flu, made some brilliant shots in scoring 26 off 21 balls,, and Dayle Hadlee tried to hit Julian for four, amid the encircling gloom, with fatal results. Julian was all persistence, and deserved his big bag.:

TENSE DRAW i Cricket (ended for the season at Garrick Park on a very high note when Woolston Working Men's Club and Marist fought out a tense

draw which 'finished with Marist requiring 10 runs to win, [and Woolston wanting just one wicket. The game was ’ | highlighted by Garry Hooper, who finally obtained the two wickete he needed to equal; David Trist’s post-w’ar season record |of 81.

Woolston was 37 runs behind ]with 10 Second innings wickets standing when the game l resumed. Initially, runs proved very j hard to get, Anup.] Nathu | treating the bowling of Andrew Boyle and Gary [ MacDonald with extreme suspiciop. Only 31 runs camel up in the first hour's play but once the arrears had been hit off, first Peter Sullivan and then peter Kennedy lined i up ■ Hooper for some punishing treatment which would have ] shattered a bowler with ] less ability. Nathii anchored the innings expertly, and i t was a shame that his efforts were not capped with, the century he deserved. His | innings lasted nearly four hours in sharp contrast to Kennedy,; whose 68 runs included 13 sweetly timed boundaries.

The absence; through illness of Mark Hastings seriously weakened Marist’s bowling permutations. [Although MacDonald and ! Hooper were severely punished at times, Justin Boyle had little option but to keep them on for the final 36 overs of the game. Both responded nobly to the task.

Gary Gardners declaration left' Marist a' target of 203 runs in just ’Over two hours and the final] 20 overs. The game went right to the wire and although [ Greg Hills, Hooper, . Paul Adams and Andrew Boyle j batted with tenacity, wickets fell at regular intervals. With eight overs left Woolston needed only-two wickets to record its second win for the season, but pressure got to: the; fieldsman at crucial stages'and Marist successfully held on. Once again, Hastings’ absence was sorely felt/ II !

'Woolston’s best bowler was Russell Grant (Who bowled his well-flighted left arm slows for 22 overs without a break. He was assisted in his endeavours by I excellent outfielding, with Peter Steele. James Shipley and Campbell Grant outstanding at times. The game as a whole was a fitting finale [to a season in which fate .riould have at times treated [both sides more kindly. I '