General News
3 March, 2022
Absences leave Cats short
JACK Lehmann’s innings of 70 couldn’t stop Mortlake from sliding to its second loss of the season against a determined Pomborneit last Saturday.
JACK Lehmann’s innings of 70 couldn’tstop Mortlake from sliding to its second loss of the season against a determined Pomborneit last Saturday.
Mortlake remains in first place on the ladder with a game to go, only a game ahead of the Bulls but almost certainly safe there with a big percentage lead.
The Cats won the toss and batted, and openers Corey Rounds (27) and Todd Lamont (18) made a promising start, but with Lamont’s dismissal at 1/29 quickly followed by the wicket of Neil Kelly (0) a run later, the incoming Lehmann had his work cut out for him.
Lehmann shepherded his side through the innings, putting together a good partnership of 61 with Lachlan Higginson (17), but the side was dismissed two balls before the end of their 50 overs with a total of 158.
The Bulls replied aggressively with the bat, using the stiff easterly breeze to attack the Camperdown end of the ground as, led by captain Grant Place (63 n.o.), they cruised to the target of 159 by the 39th over.
Cats’ skipper Todd Robertson led his team with the ball, taking 2/39 off his nine overs and Josh Slater (1/6) was economical from his five, but the rest of the Mortlake bowling attack struggled to both take wickets and contain Pomborneit’s run rate.
Despite the loss Robertson said his side had performed well in tricky circumstances and wouldn’t dwell too much on the defeat.
“I don’t want to make excuses but we had five division one players out from various issues, and if you take five up-front starters out of any team it’s going to be a lot different,” he said.
“Given the circumstances I thought the young guys that got opportunities did really well for us.
“Mitchell Hughes made his debut, he and Josh Slater both did a really good job, so it was good to get a bit of exposure to our young guys.”
Robertson conceded his side could have done more with the bat.
“Our innings was probably a bit slow getting started, we tried to take a steady approach at the start and build our way into, but we got a bit unlucky,” he said.
“We lost a couple quickly, then had a bad run-out, then lost a few more in the middle, and it pegged our run-rate back a bit.
“All in all, I thought 158 wasn’t too bad a score on Pombo’s ground, but we were probably 30 or 40 runs short of a really defensible total on that ground.
“I wasn’t too displeased with our batting effort, but our fielding and bowling needed to tidy up a little bit.”
Robertson also tipped his hat to the home side for taking advantage of the so-so total set by the Cats and the conditions.
“Bowling into that breeze was a real tough job, and made it a little easier for the Pombo batters to really attack that end,” he said.
“And to their credit they did, they were terrific.
“(Pomborneit captain) Grant Place batted really well and took his chances when he had that scoring end.”
Robertson said his side would welcome back all five absent players this week against Cobden and would look to get them back into form before finals the week after.
“We might have to tinker with the order a bit so those guys can get their opportunity out in the middle, and we want to make sure we bat as many overs as possible,” he said.
“I’m pretty happy with where we’re situated, we’ve given ourselves every chance to give it a crack come the finals.
“We’ve got a younger core that’s mature enough now with players such as Isaac Wareham, Will Kane and Jack Lehmann. They’ve played a lot of cricket now and they’ve got a lot of experience under their belt.
“All that experience will hold us in good stead for finals, and hopefully we can go a long way.”