By Gary Caffell
Opener Brock Price steered Lansdowne to a comfortable five-wicket win over Wairarapa College on Saturday, and in doing so guaranteed them automatic entry into Wairarapa Cricket’s Umpires Cup final next Sunday.
At 39-4 chasing 129 for victory Lansdowne were not exactly in the box seat but it was then that Price took control.
Quick to seize on anything loose he hammered nine fours and one six in his unbeaten 67 made from 74 balls and his fifth wicket partnership with the more conservative Sanjay Patel (19), was worth 45 valuable runs.
The Wairarapa College wickets were shared amongst three bowlers with Frank Dickson taking 2-32 from seven overs, Brad Griffith 2-33 from five overs and Michael Brewster 1-20 from five overs.
Earlier it was Griffith who had dominated the Wairarapa College batting effort, scoring 70 off their 128 runs. Typically he placed the emphasis on attack, facing just 55 balls and finding the boundary on 12 occasions.
The next highest score for the students was “Mr Extras” with 25.
In fact, only one other batsman made it into double figures and there were four “ducks”.
Young medium pacer Drew Macdonald shone with the ball for Lansdowne, finishing with 4-41 off nine overs while Hayden Barrett chimed in with 2-33 from eight overs.
Short scoreboard:
WAIRARAPA COLLEGE 128 (H.Wakeling 11, Bunny 3, Brewster 2, Griffith 70, Wootton 0, Dickson 0, Coley 0, Steventon 7, Payne 0, Lewis 9, Hare 1 not out, extras 25; fall of wickets, 16, 21, 51, 51, 53, 53, 79, 80, 117, 121; D.Macdonald 9-1-41-4, Bailey 4-0-24-1, Barrett 8-0-33-2, Hook-Sporry 2-0-12-1, Patel 1.4-0-12-1) lost to LANSDOWNE
195-5 (Dingle 0, B.Price 67 not out, Dennes-Wilson 7, D.Price 0, Te Whare 9, Patel 19, Hook-Sporry 9 not out, extras 8; fall of wickets, 6, 13, 14, 29, 94; Brewster 5-1-20-1, Dickson 7-0-32-2, Griffith 5-0-33-2, Wakeling 7-0-33-0, Steventon 1-0-10-0) by five wickets.
Greytown completed their Umpire’s Cup preliminary round programme with a six-wicket win over Red Star and will now confront Rathkeale College in the semi-final next Saturday, the winner of which will play Lansdowne for the title the following day.
Red Star batted first and apart from an opening partnership of 29 between Nathan Elliott and Dion Knight their innings had little substance to it and they were all out for 91, a score which would have looked much worse but for extras providing 29 runs.
Elliott was patience personified, his 17 coming from 81 balls.
All six bowlers used by Greytown picked up wickets with Daniel Ingham finishing with 2-10 from seven overs, Peter Aiken 2-18 off five overs and Gordon Reisima 2-3 off two overs.
Greytown took 21 overs and lost four wickets to achieve the 92 runs needed for victory and it was Robbie Speers who grabbed the limelight.
His 41 came off 42 balls and included six fours and two sixes, meaning that all but five of his runs came from boundaries.
Peter Sigvertsen with 2-27 from seven overs and Robbie Anderson with 2-36 from eight overs were the main wicket takers for Red Star.
Short scoreboard:
RED STAR 91 (Knight 9, Elliott 17, Deans 6, Anderson 3, Caldwell 11, Austin 9, Towgood 6, Sigvertsen 1, Russo 0 not out, Luman 0, Garnett 0, extras 29; fall of wickets, 29, 44, 52, 63, 76, 78, 82, 88, 89, 91; Ingham 7-3-10-2, Burt 3.1-0-13-1, Speers 10-1-18-1, James 7-0-21-1, Aiken 5-1-18-2, Reisima 2-0-3-2) lost to GREYTOWN 92-4 (Morrison 12, Ross 10, Burling 0, Speers 41, Reisima 15 not out, Ingham 5 not out, extras 9;fall of wickets 13, 17, 46, 76; Russo 5-1-19-0, Sigvertsen 7-1-27-2, Anderson 8-2-36-2, Garnett 1-0-7-0) by six wickets.
