|
Another victory for Fourths
Larne's fourth eleven warmed up for their cup quarter-final with an
impressive 30-run victory over North Down during the week. North Down
won the toss, and with a mixture of optimism and naivety they decided to
field first in the hope of bowling Larne out for 50 and making it home
for the early football match. The game began at twelve o'clock,
although as the visitors took the field Larne had only five players at
Sandy Bay due to an organizational oversight. Numerous frantic
phone-calls were made to the team-members' homes informing them that the
match had already started, and Larne eventually reached full strength.
Indeed, the players kept arriving and the home side soon had 13 players
from which to choose from!
The chaos clearly affected the top-order, with Burke and Smith both
being dismissed quickly. However, Wylie McKinty, who was making a rare
guest-appearance, took charge of the situation and forced the visitors
onto the back-foot with a series of clinical fours. His first boundary
was a scintillating cover drive which raced all along the ground as if
attached to a tiny unseen train terminating just beyond the cover
boundary, and there was no better shot played all day. McKinty looked
in excellent touch, and it was surely only fatigue induced by the
sweltering heat that saw him dismissed for 26.
At the other end, the talented young Larne batsmen were struggling
badly. The early start had coincided with a late night soiree at the
Hill residence, and wickets fell at regular intervals as several
dishevelled youths were dismissed by impetuous shots. Ryan Hamill
though played a superb innings to keep Larne on track for a competitive
total. The young man put aside his personal disappointment at the
recent cricketing farce in his native Zimbabwe to score 44
finely-crafted runs. He hit five boundaries, and timed the ball off his
legs superbly. After showing great patience though he was eventually
lured down the wicket and stumped going for a hit that would have
brought up his fifty. It was a fine innings, and he was unfortunate not
to reach his first fifty for the club.
At 133 for 8 in the 33rd over, Larne were still some ways short of
securing victory, although they had successfully shattered North Down's
hopes of watching the early football match. The last seven overs though
saw another 44 runs being scored, with the three Kings (Andrew, Simon
and Darren) all making good contributions. Andrew finished on 24 not
out, and Larne's final total of 174 for 9 was always likely to prove
difficult to get. The contributions from the lower order were crucial
in Larne's eventual victory.
North Down though made an excellent start, reaching 70 for 1 in the 17th
over. One huge six sailed out of the ground toward the sea, never to be
seen again and Larne were in serious trouble when they turned again the
young King boys. This time they brought gifts of wickets instead of
runs, with Simon teasingly bowling some fine spin whilst Darren hit the
leg-stump of the opening batsmen who had left the delivery alone before
being beaten by some sharp late movement. Another of the successful
batsmen, Ryan Hamill, also weighed in with two crucial wickets as North
Down began crumbling under the intense pressure generated by the home
side.
However, the visitors refused to give up. Their top-scorer was extras,
which steadily and ruthlessly accumulated its runs throughout the
innings. There were just eight wides when North Down bowled, but Larne,
who bowled every bit as accurately as the opposition, were called for an
absurd 25 wides. In addition, Simon King was no-balled for bowling the
slowest, most innocuous leg-stump full toss imaginable, as the situation
descended toward farce. The idea that fourth eleven cricketers should
be subjected to the same interpretation of what is a wide ball as is
seen in professional cricket on television is ridiculous, and indeed
makes a mockery of the game itself.
In fairness though, the umpires gave dismissals without any sign of
prejudice, and the match was balanced on a knife-edge when North Down
reached 136-6 in the 33rd over. They needed just 39 from the remaining
seven overs when Andrew King began his third over from the Leisure
Centre end of the ground. He pitched the ball up to the bat with his
medium-fast bowling and was rewarded for his accuracy when he grabbed
two wickets in consecutive deliveries, both caught at cover as the
lower-order mis-timed their drives. The fielder in both instances was
Jonathon Graham, who demonstrated an amazing degree of sangfroid in
holding both catches without difficulty when a lesser fielder would
surely have wilted under the intense pressure.
That left Andrew King on a hat-trick, and although he was not able to
complete the feat, he still had time to produce a superb pair of caught
and bowled dismissals. His second one in particular must go down as
being one of the finest ever seen at Sandy Bay, as the new batsmen
lashed at his first ball and connected with a perfect aerial
straight-drive which seemed destined to go for four. However, Andrew
changed direction form his natural follow-through toward the off side
and dived full-length to his right to clasp an utterly unbelievable
catch. He finished with 4-16, and it would have been very difficult to
decide whether he or Ryan Hamill was the man of the match. A good piece
of stumping from Craig Smith and the game was over, and it was remained
un-clear whether North Down were able to make it home in time for the
evening football match, let alone the afternoon one.
The home-side had
won by 30 runs in a match kindly sponsored by Larne Harbour Company. |
