Alex Hewet took five wickets for the match for Yarraville in their loss to Ivanhoe over the weekend. 75949 Picture: EMILY LANE
By Adem Saricaoglu
YARRAVILLE disappointingly fell well short of victory on Saturday, after it failed to chase down an achievable target of 166 in its VSDCA two-day clash with Ivanhoe at Yarraville Oval.
Ivanhoe took 49.5 overs to dismiss Yarraville for just 84, setting up its big win.
Leigh Holmes was the only Yarraville batsman to get a decent start, making 35, while opener Timothy McRae made 17.
Holmes lost eight batting partners, before Ryan Fort trapped him LBW late in the innings.
The next highest score from a Yarraville batsman was nine, by wicket-keeper Daniel Torre in the tail end.
Yarraville captain Nick Meletis said he wasn’t happy with the team’s performance on Saturday.
“It was very disappointing to capitulate the way we did,” he said.
When asked what the game plan was prior to the start of play on day two, Meletis said it was “pretty basic and that was to bat for 80 overs”.
“Some of the boys played a few rash shots and that didn’t give us much of a chance to win it in the end.”
Luke Waddell was the pick of the bowlers for Ivanhoe, claiming three crucial wickets, including that of McRae, for just 10 runs in 11 overs.
That along with his other two wickets sparked Yarraville’s mid-order collapse, taking them from 1/24 to 4/33.
Paul Thomas and Daniel Saville couldn’t produce a single run between them in that stretch.
Muhammad Saeed’s bowling figures were also outstanding for Ivanhoe, claiming 2/12 off 10 overs, while James Birch took 2/7 off his four overs.
Birch’s dismissal of Curtis Maguire for two had Yarraville six wickets down with just 33 runs on the board.
Alex Hewet, whose bowling performance a week earlier saw him take four wickets off a mammoth 24 overs, was the next batsman to go, making just seven when Birch bowled him out to leave Yarraville on 6/42.
Meletis was sent back to the pavilion five runs later, before Torre added nine runs of his own prior to his dismissal.
Patrick Prestidge then became the eighth man to fall with Holmes still at the non-strikers end and Yarraville at 9/64.
Holmes and Josh Booth made a last-wicket stand of 20, but needed another 82 to claim what would have been a miraculous comeback win.
Meletis says the club’s main goal for the remainder of the season to be competitive, considering the side is relatively inexperienced.
“Even though it’s a disappointing loss, the club knows where we are at, so I think we are heading in the right direction,” he said.
