In form … Yarraville’s Lachlan Sneddon in the field. 58654 Picture: EMILY LANE
By Michael Esposito
WILLIAMSTOWN’S under 15 cricket side just missed out on a quarter finals berth in the protracted RM Hatch series after a narrow loss to Broadmeadows on Thursday.
Williamstown defeated Yarraville and Altona before coming up against Broadmeadows, where the winner was assured a spot in the quarters.
Williamstown came within a hair’s breadth of victory, but Broadmeadows, with nine wickets down, surpassed Williamstown’s total of 126 in the second last over.
Matthew Dervan, who has been playing in Williamstown’s second X1 side, hit 118 runs over three matches and was only dismissed once.
Team-mate Aaron Christensen was superb with the ball, taking six wickets in three games.
With the first three matches washed out, the seven teams in the west group only played either two or three of the six scheduled matches, depending on whether they had a bye.
Broadmeadows and Melton advanced to the quarter finals from the west group, having won their three games.
Altona won one of three games while Yarraville’s sole victory came at Altona’s expense.
Altona’s Jack King and James Grubb performed with the bat, averaging 34 and 32.5 respectively.
Yarraville’s best bowler was Matthew Devlin (three wickets from two matches at an average of 10), while Amanpreet Guraya took the most of his one opportunity to bat with 60 not out.
Playing in the west group, Werribee came up 35 runs short of Altona in the 45-over game on Tuesday, before being dismissed just two runs shy of eventual top team Broadmeadows’ total of 119 on Wednesday.
Werribee was not as competitive against Melton on Thursday, being bowled out for 98 and being surpassed in the 38th over by Melton, who had six wickets to spare.
Werribee’s captain and wicketkeeper, Mason Frenkel, was impressive with the bat, averaging 24.3 with a highest score of 41, while fellow opener Gavin Kalnins averaged 31.5 with a top score of 40.
Ryan Alifraco led the bowling with five wickets for 44 runs at an average of 8.8.
