A FRESH crop of local under-12 cricketers are emerging as a force to be reckoned with after their decisive win over Coffs Harbour last month.
The team, consisting of only three players who have played representative cricket before, scored an impressive 177 runs from 40 overs and then managed to restrict Coffs Harbour to just 88 runs.
Coffs Harbour had travelled to Armidale to contest the annual pre-season Sportspower Surf ’n’ Turf competition.
“Coffs fields pretty strong sides in this comp each year and to win by that much is a credit to the 12s”, Armidale Cricket Association’s Helen Dennis said.
“It’s quite a number of years since Armidale’s under-12s have beaten Coffs Harbour at this level, so they’ve done incredibly well.”
The team was given a good start by openers Ben Hamilton (30) and Ben Friend (17). Cotter Litchfield then took control scoring 54 not out and hitting seven fours along the way.
The bowlers weren’t left in the batsmen’s shadows however, with Marley Lynch (2-8) and Ben Friend (2-5) also excelling with the ball.
Unfortunately, the under-14s couldn’t emulate the success of their younger counterparts as they were comprehensively beaten by Coffs’ under-14s side.
Coffs Harbour batted first and, after a slow start, their number 4 and 5 batsmen turned the innings around, putting together a massive 177-run partnership.
“In hindsight it was this partnership that took the game away from Armidale,” Helen said.
She said Coffs set Armidale a total of 228 runs and despite a solid 37 runs from Joe Gordon and many ’starts’ from the middle order, Armidale could only manage 103 in reply.
“Our 14s are a relatively young side and while they lost the game, it was certainly a good experience for them. Coastal teams usually provide pretty high quality competition, so it was good for this team to play Coffs before the Northern Inland comp starts next month.”
Both Armidale teams are now looking forward to the beginning of the Northern Inland Rep Competition in October.
