What a Fred letter week it has been for the club, wins all round, the ladies make finals and to quote our coach, the club has turned the corner, and then some!
First XI
Finally back to two day cricket after the shenanigans of the past 6 weeks and back to business. Meeting the top side Old Ivanhoe at our present home ground (Donath number 4 for those playing at home), an excellent start of 0/60 wasn’t capitalized upon and resulted in a challenging target of 236 off the allocated 80 overs with Blair Foxcroft showing the way with another A Grade century posting 119. Honouable mentions to Rahul Khurana with 28 and Brenton Jones posting a solid unbeaten 9, his highest score since he played junior cricket.
Tough, hard and uncompromising Camrea cricket followed on day 2 and with the chips down, whips cracking and flies seriously buzzing around Keon Park, the boys came through smashing the tail to take 4/16 and knock Old Ivanhoe over for 209. Abhishek with 3/46, Milan with 3/52 and Sai with 2/47 leading the way. Onward and upward. The season now gets interesting.
Second XI
The first game against the Nepalese was pretty tight with a undermanned side, the return journey went a lot better for the 2s. Set a challenging target of 187 to win battling the heat, a wilting umpire, questionable ethical/moral representation from the opposition saw Dheerin carry the flag with the ball taking 4/45, young Father Time Greg Millin with 3/45 and Chandra 3/63 highlighting another #nojustice day for Muhammed Biggy Habieb.
A tremendous all round performance from Dheerin saw him open the batting smashing 74, ably supported by Chandra with 36 and Mo fight back with 31 to cruise to victory in 54 overs after Roan Ekenaike and Danny Pougios decided to get over their aching bodies and hit boundaries rather than run both scoring 13no. This is also El Presidente’s highest score since the completion of the Reagan administration after someone showed him which end of the stick to hold.
Yay cricket Nick Stojcevski, Yay cricket and congratulations on your first win as skipper. The last one was terrible.
Third XI
The Greatest Team in the Free World called an audible on Thursday and decided to play on Donath Number 5 instead of Number 2, because that’s just how they roll to be fair. Losing some big names before the game, set off more tension in Gaza than the current rocket attacks with our loyal supporters in Beirut and the West Bank eagerly counting the numbers of Mustafas in play; there were only 4 this week, but that was plenty.
Losing the toss and bowling, the opposition made 191, ordinarily a challenging score, but let’s be honest, this is not an ordinary side. With representation from many continents around the globe, once more it was Whispering Death Mustafa who took 3/36, assisted by Brian Ah-Lit (this bloke seriously Ah-Lit them up yesterday) with 2/39 and Sam Emini getting 2/17, a catch and dropping a pie to cost us 10 runs in the last over.
Thankfully, the prayers to all the gods were heard and Neil Kommu faced the greatest delivery in the history of cricket to be bowled for 2 (missed a straight one) but this brought Robbo to the crease for a 3rd unbeaten 50 in 4 innings until the game changer Brian Ah-Lit sparkled and won the game really with his own 53 not out. 191 chased down with a cameo from Whispering Death 16no and a very good all round game from Tony Barulovski 19 and 1/27 saw the 3rds bring home the chocolates.
3 wins from the last 3 games and sitting second.
Gunna be a great year Camrea, get on board we’ve some seriously big functions coming including the family day BBQ on 14/12/24 and the Christmas Function on 21/12/24. Go Stingrays!!!