The 9ths carried along their merry way, rolling Cuzza Canes during our Luddenham excursion. We had a very exciting car trip to the game, seeing wallabies and cows, and even some prickly pear! When we got there, it was like we were actually in the bush!
Seriously though, the Gladdies took the opportunity to bat, and while the bowling was adequate, the field was a lot bigger than Johnstone Reserve, and a little slow early. Cue many, many, many 2s. The drive to try and score got the better of us, and we lost 7 wickets for 117 against their four best bowlers in the first 25 overs. Things were looking a little grim.
Fortunately, their last two bowlers were pretty ordinary, and our last two batsmen were Banjo, who’d already scored 40, and Marty, who is, well, Marty. And they sure did make hay against the two bowlers the Canes had been trying to hide in the back half of the innings. In what is likely his farewell appearance before fatherhood, Banjo brought up his 50 (many times if you believe the small but vocal crowd), shortly followed by Marty, who clubbed 6 4s and 2 6s on a big ground on the way to his 50. The Canes desperately went back to their young guns, but they just tried a little too hard and all of a sudden wides and byes started peppering the boundary. Sick of scoring runs, Marty took a bat to his stumps, before Banjo notched his way up to 85. In the end we racked up 229, assisted in no small way by a valiant 48 from S.Undries.
Soli had one of those spells where everything just comes together, and walked away with career best figures of 5/16, of which 3 were clean bowled. That very much took the wind out of the Canes sails, and I headed home. The Gladdies all but ended the Canes resistance, reducing them to 7/34 at drinks. But it sounds like they grimly batted on, and on, late into the afternoon, with no hope of winning, but some hope of making everyone unhappy about the end of the game. They managed to last until the 35th over, with one bloke getting a fairly pointless 78, as they finished 106 runs short.
So that pretty much guarantees the 9ths a finals berth… now we have to focus on the 10ths.
