LEONGATHA and District Cricket Association is locked in a battle today at Melbourne Country Week Cricket to protect its position in the top section of the state’s premier regional competition.
The association team won its final qualifying match of the week in thrilling circumstances against Bendigo on Wednesday when Mitchell Clark 62 not out played the dominant innings as the lower order bats came and went within sight of victory.
It need not have been as hard as they made it, having dominated the Bendigo bats, despatching them for a seemingly uncompetitive 173 with Ron Abeysinghe 3/11 off 6.3 and Ethan Lamers 3/34 off 10 leading the way and Joel Brann, George McCausland and Mitchell Clark chipping in with one each.
In a key run out that robbed Bendigo of any momentum, Mustafa Nader got the return in quickly to Jack Butcher behind the stumps to take down Kyle Humphrys who had been striking the ball well.
Both Clark and Lamers made good contributions to the chase but a crucial little cameo by Joel Brann of 16 off 17 balls got them up to the target and Leongatha passed the target nine down with an over to spare.
Leongatha went within an ace of setting their week up for success on day one against the strong Casey-Cardinia outfit when they made 8/264 and despite being 20 shy of where they’d have liked to be but nearly made it enough in the final analysis.
Madura Madusanka got some late wickets to keep the pressure on the opposition and scores were level with one delivery to come. Jason Williams struck a four off the last ball and the opportunity was narrowly lost.
The match at Footscray against Geelong on Tuesday was more clear cut paving the way to Wednesday’s win and a playoff against Bairnsdale at Walter Galt Reserve Mordialloc.
Leongatha won the toss and sent Bairnsdale in to bat but it might not have been a good strategy with the Bairnsdale batsmen all filling their boots on the way to a huge total off 50 overs of 9/366 that’s going to take some chasing!
Leongatha was off to a flyer with Jack Curtis 62 runs of 33 and Ethan Lamers 30 off 16 but apart from a steadying 23 from Alex Geyer it fell apart from there with the local team floundering at 8/161 off 27 overs. The veteran Damien Symmons came in late and with Jake Cochrane could be able to keep the chase going but not 366, not with only one batsman in the sheds.
Follow the scores at https://www.playhq.com/cricket-australia/org/victorian-country-cricket-league/summer-202425/senior-men-provincial/game-centre/719c82c2