Cobar/Temora game a highlight of VB Country Plate
Wednesday January 21, 2009
Cobar’s senior representative cricket team travelled to Temora between Christmas and New Year to contest
the finals carnival of the statewide VB
Country Plate competition and returned with a win and a loss in the series.
In their first match Cobar played Eurobodalla (a team made up of players from Bateman’s Bay, Tuross Heads and other towns along the south coast).
Eurobodalla won the toss and batted first on what seemed to be a very slow and flat wicket.
They lost three early wickets and when their left handed opening batsman Tim Hartshorn (a south coast representative player) was dismissed for 11 the remainder of the Eurobodalla batsmen capitulated and were all out for a score of only 38 with sundries the second top score of eight.
Cobar’s captain and opening bowler Phil Harley was the main destroyer with the ball taking the magnificent figures of eight wickets for 19 runs from eight overs, two of which were maidens.
These bowling figures are the best ever by a Cobar representative player surpassing the previous best of seven wickets for three runs, also held by Harley.
Doug North, with 1/5 off three overs and Stewart Fraser with 1/13 from four overs, were the other wicket takers.
Opening batsmen Craig Dillon (13 not out) and Jake Harbison (23 not out)
proceeded to score the required runs from only seven overs without the loss of a wicket.
The match lasted a total of just 22 overs and the Cobar boys were back at their motel and in the pool before the other matches had finished their first innings.
On the second day Cobar played home team Temora in the semi-finals.
Harley won the toss and batted first. Cobar got off to a disastrous start.
Birthday boy Harbison was dismissed for a golden duck on the second ball and Dillon was out shortly after for one.
Cobar had slumped soon to 2/11.
And so it was left to the in-form batsmen over the last few seasons in the local Cobar competition North, Fraser and Harley to resurrect the situation.
They did, in fine fashion, with North scoring 18, Harley making 24, and Fraser had a great innings of 64.
Some late hitting by Damien Harbison (27) and Jade Buckman (14) took Cobar’s score to a competitive total of nine wickets down for 190 from their 50 overs.
Temora’s opening batsmen started confidently and the early talk in the grandstand was that Cobar’s score was about 50 runs short of the mark.
However when Harley took two wickets in his third over, Temora was 2/11 and looking at exactly the same start as Cobar had made in their innings.
When a third wicket fell with the score at 37, things became a lot quieter back in the grandstand.
The strong Temora middle order batting line-up with scores of 20, 20, 22, 13 and 22 not out, battled hard against some very good bowling from the Cobar side.
After a very tense final few overs, Temora scored the winning runs with only four balls remaining in the match.
They finished with 8/191.
All Cobar’s bowlers performed admirably with Harley again having the best figures of the match with 3/32.
He was ably supported by Dillon (2/29), Wade Potter (1/19), Fraser (1/29) and John Potter (1/51).
Also of mention for his efforts was North who, although did not take a wicket, had only 17 runs scored off his 10 overs.
He also had a couple of chance catches dropped.
Young 14 year old Wade Potter also played well and was brought on to bowl during the tense final overs in the match.
Wade acquitted himself very well and had the more experienced Temora batsmen playing and missing at a number of his
deliveries.
A significant point in the game came when Wade had to be taken out of the
bowling attack due to young age bowling restrictions.
Temora went on to easily win the final game against Upper Hunter.
This is the second year in succession
that Cobar has been beaten in the semi-finals of this competition by the eventual winner.
The match against Temora was a highlight as Temora had very experienced and accomplished players, one who was an ex Australian Country Team cricketer and NSW Country Cricketer of the year, also two other ex NSW Country representatives and a recently returned opening bowler who played first grade cricket in Sydney with Easter Suburbs.
For Cobar to take on a team with this amount of experience and “take it to them” right up the last four balls of the match, is a fantastic achievement.
The Cobar team will now concentrate their efforts on trying to win the so far elusive Brewery Shield competition in which they will play Bourke.
Cobar hosts the match at Ward Oval next month.
The local senior competition will recommence next Saturday.—contributed
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