1st grade maintained their lead at the top of the competition comfortably defended 307 with the wickets shared between all of the bowlers. 2’s on the other hand ground out a great victory restricting The Sharks to 259 in their pursuit of 281. Luke Grant was the main man for Rowan Hamman’s side with 4 crucial wickets.
3’s unfortunately went down at home after Sutherland passed 149 8 wickets down in what was a tight loss. 4th grade snuck home in their chase of 124 with Billy D’Arcy the rock with a vital 45 at the top of the order. Finally 5’s had a convincing win comfortbly defending 198 with Ben Kittlety and Max Burgess doing the bulk of the damage with 3 wickets each.
So with 3 rounds remaining the TravelSim Waratahs are placed in the top 6 of each grade, and lead the club championships by just under 200 points. It’s shaping up as a massive conclusion to the season for the Tahs, but a vital round against the strong Penrith club will provide an important test for us once again. Until next time, Go Manly!
4 Pines P
layer of the Week – Luke Grant
layer of the Week – Luke GrantThis weeks 4 Pines Player of the Week goes to Luke Grant for his vital 4 wicket haul against Sutherland at Glenn McGrath Oval. Arriving to a flat deck and lightning fast outfield, 2nd grade had to toil hard all day for wickets and were led by Luke with his crafty medium-fast deliveries.
This reward is well deserved for a man who has been a consistent performer throughout the grades over the last couple of seasons. With finals just around the corner, LG has peaked at the right time and could prove to be a vital cog in 2nd grades charge towards the top of the competition. Well done LG!
1st Grade – Manly 9/307 (Lenton 58, Crosthwaite 44, Merchant 42, T. Cruikshank 40) def. Sutherland 220 (M. Edwards 3/34, N. Bills 2/27, N. McLachlan 2/42, J. Munting 2/78)
1st grade came to Manly Oval looking to defend the 9 for 307 we scored from last week. The deck was a typical Manly Oval deck, pretty flat with nothing but hard work for the bowlers.
Declaring before the start of play, we started off on fire in the field with Jimmy Munting bowling their opener in the first over with a pearler of a delivery. The other opener was caught smartly by Adam Crosthwaite at 2nd slip with the score on 23, and the boys were off.
We seemed to lose our way a little bit with the ball from here until the end of the 1st session, with our lines and lengths presenting the Sutherland batsmen with some easy scoring opportunities. Sutherland scored 141 in the first session of play off 32 overs, a run rate that was a good summary of how we bowled.
However, the next session was exactly what we wanted. The bowlers found their lines and lengths and we started to strangle the Sutherland batsmen. Wickets fell regularly, and other than their number 4 Brown, who played well for 129 not out (although we gave him a few chances), no one else got above 31.
We eventually bowled them out for 220 after 50 overs. Mickey Edwards cleaned up the tail, but all bowlers contributed with Mickey taking 3, James Munting 2, Nic Bills 2 Nick McLachlan 2 and Luke Diserens 1 wicket.
The victory takes us 10 points clear of 2nd placed Bankstown, with the Minor Premiership in sight with 3 rounds to go.
“Mickey Edwards celebrates one of his 3 wickets”
“Nicko’s once again amongst the wickets”
“Munter thinks it has got to be close”
2nd Grade – Manly 281 (E. Burgess 60, R. Farrell 58, J. Ritchie 50, T. Kaye 45) def. Sutherland 259 (L. Grant 4/73, T. Beatty 2/76)
The Manly 2’s boys turned up to Glenn McGrath knowing that they would have to bowl and field extremely well to come away with the 6 points.
Taylor Beatty and Luke Grant gave us the perfect start with the guys fielding well around them to reduce Sutherland to 7-110 at lunch.
The middle session saw Sutherland bat really well on a pitch that was at that stage looking like an absolute belter. The pair put on over a hundred to get them right back in the picture for the 6 points.
Tommy Kaye got us the key wicket with a nice little outswinger that caught the edge and we were in business just before tea. At tea the equation was 2 wickets needed for the Manly boys to win and 29 for Sutherland. The Manly boys held their nerve to get a clutch runout and then Ryan Farrell bowled a guy through his legs to secure our great win!
Jarrod Walter
3rd Grade – Manly 149 (A. Bariol 36, Z. Trewartha 27, W. Evans 22, J. Daly 18) def. by Sutherland 8/150 (W. Evans 3/32, N. McCallum-Toomey 3/46, J. Carden 2/25)
3rd grade had their second loss for the year in a tight game at Grahame’s. The pitch improved over the course of the week and with the exception of a little bit of variable bounce well wide of off stump, it played quite placidly. The humid conditions allowed for some swing but with just 149 runs on the board we never really got ourselves into a comfortable position. Sutherland just kept on having their noses in front for the day and a 2 wicket loss was the outcome.
Needing early breakthroughs Carden (2/25) and Evans (3/32) bowled well and the number of play and misses was frustrating. Eventually the #3 tickled one from Jake and they were 3/51. Toomey (3/46) came on and he also bowled well and he had the #4 caught behind as well to make it 4/61. Their #5 and 6 then got together for a valuable 34 run partnership. Neither bat looked particularly at ease and when Nick knocked over the #6 to make it 5/95 we had a sniff. Soon after Nick trapped in front the #7 to make it 6/111. The incoming batsman looked very ill at ease early on and we were unlucky that one of his numerous spars at the ball did not find the edge. Their #5 who looked like steering them home then hit one to mid off to make it 7/125. This was probably as close as it got. The new batsman could not put bat on ball but the bloke still in started to see them OK and on the flat deck started to dish out some meaty blows to take the game away from us. Jake got the 8th wicket with 6 to win and, with about 4 more play and misses Sutherland sneaked home. Knowing their #11 is not known for his batting we were only a wicket away from a unlikely win.
Given the number of players out this week we did well to stay in touch with Sutherland during the game. With a close to full strength team next week I am sure 3rd grade will let Penrith know it is not all one way traffic for them and we will get back in the hunt for a top 2 finish.
WE
4th Grade – Manly 8/126 (B. D’Arcy 45) def. Sutherland 124 (Joe. Graham 2/7, Jac. Graham 2/18, J. Wood 2/18)
4th grade returned to Sutherland Oval looking to chase down Sutherland’s total of 124 set the previous week. After losing 2 early wickets the first week, Billy D’Arcy and Jack Pickering batted confidently for the first few overs of the morning before Pickering (9) held out in the deep in the overs leading to drinks.
Billy batted superbly for a well-made 45 combining with Will Outred (9) and skipper Josh Petersen (20) to push our score along to within 30 odd runs of the total. This is when things started to turn shaky, with the loss of quick wickets Manly stumbled to 8/117 before the cool, calm and collected Ryan Bishop-Perret (8) hit the winning runs. Jacob Graham played a steady hand at the other end finishing with 7*.
We batted on for a few more overs before we lost our last wicket, finishing with a total of 129.It was a good win for the boys set up on the back of a dominant display with the ball in the first week.
Joel Wood
5th Grade – Manly 198 (S. Waddington 68, E. Hole 25. B. Kittlety 21) def. Sutherland 140 (B. Kittlety 3/31, M. Burgess 3/34, W. Denny 2/16, J. Edwards 2/17)
The boys arrived at Mike Pawley with 10 wickets needed on a standard MP deck with Sutherland chasing 198 after being 0-9 after 5 overs overnight.
Ben and Will Denny opened the proceedings and started well searching for their areas and it was not long until the 2 were in sync with each other and were bowling in partnership. Will picked up the first wicket with the first of many catches for Sam Kelly. In the very next over Ben grabbed the edge again. The two then picked up another wicket each in their spells and when Baino came into the attack he was also on the money and was very unlucky to not pick up a wicket. The pressure was right on the Sutherland boys with 4 early wickets lost and runs seemed scarce. Runs were coming hard to find with few bad balls. Maxy and Jack then came into the attack. Max bowled very economically and after his 15 overs grabbed 3 wickets and Jack bowled 5 overs for 2 wickets. Isaiah then joined Max and bowled with good spin and bounce and created a few chances, but was unlucky to not pick up a pole. Ben was then brought back into action and after one ball had finished Sutherland’s innings.
A great win by the boys where pressure was built all day and the lines and lengths were tight, defeating Sutherland by 58 runs.
Jack Edwards
