Kapelan Kulendranathan in action for Sunshine on Saturday. 73333 Picture: DAMIAN VISENTINI
BY MICHAEL ESPOSITO
SUNSHINE’S bowlers could not find a way to combat Aaron Maynard, whose masterful 150 guided Altona to victory in round four of Sub-District cricket on Saturday.
Chasing 153, Altona made the required runs with seven wickets to spare, and went on to post 310.
Maynard and Craig Duff put on a sublime 144-run partnership, and it took a run out to finally dismiss the top run scorer.
Sunshine coach Andrew Webb, who got the first breakthrough with the wicket of John Varchione (40), said Maynard batted with a precision his batsmen lacked.
“The thing that he did that we probably struggled to last week was find the gaps, and even when we had a strong offside field he still seemed to find the gaps. We had batsmen last week who didn’t do it,” Webb said.
“I think we probably would have added an extra hundred if two or three batsmen could have found the gaps that Aaron was getting.”
Webb made no excuses for his side’s uncompetitive score, saying the there was little difference between the pitch on both weekends of play.
“There was a bit of uneven bounce and low bounce in it, but still no demons in it either week,” he said.
“I just thought that we didn’t make enough runs. I don’t think many people threw their wickets away, it was just the shot selection, and the intent to stick around and go through the hard yards to put a partnership together.”
“That’s one thing our batsmen need to look at, batting in pairs and batting for a long time, and working as a team. If we go out there as individuals we’re not really going to succeed in anything we do.”
Kapelan Kulendranathan was Sunshine’s most dangerous bowler, taking 4/47 from 15 overs. He was the only multiple wicket taker for Sunshine.
Webb did extract some positives out of the match, especially from his bowlers, who claimed the last five wickets for 32 runs.
“Everybody bowled fairly well towards the end of the day. I know it was a bit easier bowling to the lower order but I think when you’ve been hit for 240 in a day, then people’s heads can start to drop, but the pleasing thing was we didn’t really give up, we fought right to the end.”
Webb said poor fielding cost Sunshine about 50 runs.
“We dropped two half chances, but it was our ground fielding that summed up the day that we had.
“We probably cost ourselves 50 runs with poor fielding and overthrows. We missed four run-out chances.”
