Please see below for the 3rd XI match reports covering the fortnight just gone.
Round 10 vs Melbourne Uni CC
MUCC won the toss and batted first, and with only ten men in the field, pumped us for 352 in 40 overs. The best bowling performance came from Dave Hodgson, who picked up 2/47. Liam also chimed in with 2 wickets, but it was definitely a day we don’t want to dwell on.
When we batted they had a number of very capable bowlers, which made life difficult for us. Colby started off like a house on fire, with his first 6 scoring shots being 4’s. Malik also enjoyed hitting boundaries, with three 4’s and three 6’s in a total of 39. Rory then played his best innings for Old Carey, knocking up a very solid 67, but we never really made an impression on our target. Eventually, we were bowled out in the 39th over for 163, so it was a pretty disappointing day.
Round 11 vs Old Trinity
To avoid the extreme weather which was forecast for our Sunday game, we ended up playing Old Trinity on Saturday on the smaller Rees Oval. Once again the opposition skipper called correctly, and we had to bowl first. With Kevin Berry playing his first game for Old Carey, and Nick Langley and Louis Morrello coming down to help us out, it was quite a different team from previous weeks. Pete Marshall and Alex “Puzzles” Bell got us off to a solid start, and then Nick Langley came on for his first bowl for a while and proceeded to clean up their opening batsmen. Kurt “Tippet/Poochie” Zadnik also bowled tightly, and at 1/89 at the drinks break, things were looking okay. However, wickets in hand on Rees always makes for a very interesting last 20 overs, and unfortunately, that again was the case this week. Even though Nick Langley was able to pick up 3 wickets and Louis Morrello 2, Old Trinity were still able to find the boundaries regularly enough to post 8/257 off their 40 overs. It should be noted that our fielding was much better this game, with Huggy snaring 2 sharp chances behind the wicket, Puzzles generating a run out with a direct hit, and Kevin “07” Berry throwing himself around the field enough to cop one straight in the mouth.
After tea (which has consistently improved over recent weeks), we went out to see if we could chase down their score. Unfortunately, we lost a couple of early wickets, but that just brought Pete Marshall to the wicket earlier than expected. Given he had just bowled eight overs on a hot day, it seemed as though he couldn’t be bothered running, so he just seven 4’s and a 6 in a total score of 40. Slug provided good support at the other end with a solid 24, but once the required run rate started to climb, we lost wickets trying to keep up. Dom came in and knocked the ball around for 37, and Puzzles chipped in with 23. We were eventually all out for 169 at the end of 34 overs, which wasn’t the return that I was hoping for.
Once again there were positives to come out of our performance, and just like Melbourne FC, we are getting games into our youngsters that should do them good for futures seasons. That being said, I hope it doesn’t take us as long as them to turn our fortunes around!
Peter Weymouth
3rd XI Captain