2019 Australia Day Invitational
A fantastic day was had by one and all at Lance Hutchinson and Bland Ovals, Riverwood yesterday for the Port Jackson Invitational, with Port Jackson doing battle with the Central Coast. Lance Hutchinson Oval had the honour of hosting the inaugural VCNSW 40s match while on our adjacent Bland Oval looking after the 50s. For the 40s, and also many of the 50s, this was the first opportunity to represent Port Jackson – hopefully this game will be the first of many for them.
On the field it was a great day for the Port Jackson boys. In the over 50s match; Port Jackson Cavaliers vs Central Coast, CC batted first and reached 8/189 of their 40 overs (our 50s boys deciding to play a 40 over match). Peter Smith an impressive 4/53 off 7 overs and David Roberts closing things out with a very nice 3/22 of his 9 overs. In reply our Cavaliers reeled in the CC total in 33 overs at 3/189. Bill Dowers a very classy 30* - can’t want to see don the PJ colours again, Graham Turner a very nice to watch 32* - looking forward to seeing him at Orange, and skipper Mark Butler 30* in what seemed to only be a dozen balls. Mr. Smith following on from his 4 wickets, showing his class with a handy 22, Burnsy chiming in with 21 and John Finucane a very nice 21*.
Over on Hutcho, it seemed our opening bowler Adam Wilson was intent of having the game finishing extremely early taking the first 5 wickets in next to no time. Adam finished with the figures of 5/9 off 8 overs. He failed to get a wicket in his 3rd, 7th and 8th overs. Clearly he needs to lift his game. Our other opening bowler Jason Wilton puts this success down to a great opening bowling partnership – clearly Wilso owes Wilto a beer for those wickets. CC were all out for 159 in the last ball of the 41st over, not quite reaching their 45 overs. Cleaning up at the end was Jim Maroulis with his tweakers finishing with 4/39 off his 9 overs – not bad for a full time keeper who hasn’t bowled for a while!
In reply in debutants got off to a very strong start. After Toddy got done by a great ball getting out for 8, Attilio Gomez 41* and Rod Stoddart 40* treated everyone to a great batting display and gave the team a great foundation. Dean Parker, the second half of the Sutherland connection with Rod also provided the team with some class batting, eventually getting out for 25 in an unlucky decision. After a short loss of wickets, the enforcer Brett Lack closed out the innings with a typical Lack-like powerhouse display of 26 off only 8 scoring shots. Two singles in there Lacky – the crowd was disappointed! Port Jackson closing out the match at 4/165 in the 32nd over.
A shout and thank you to Trevor Whittal and Mark Butler who were the skippers for the day. Trevor having the honour of being the first ever Port Jackson Over 40s skipper.
