NCA 110-Over Round 2 Review

NCA 110 over competition – Round 2

With the Nelson Pine Griffins players on duty in Rangiora, local cricket attention reverts to the club 110 overs competition.  This is Round Two of this championship with teams randomly affected by rep selections.

Nelson College have a huge number of defections as they not only have players committed in Rangiora, they also have key members in Nelson and Central Districts age grade teams.  While seasoned coach Garry MacDonald is no doubt chuffed that his steads are being selected for higher honours it forces him into a real conundrum in finding suitable replacements. Jarrod McKay, Finn Restieaux and Finn Raxworthy will be amongst key personnel unavailable.  It will be time for the likes of Mason Lund, Jack Morris and youngster Jacob Walters to step up.  They play Wakatu at Victory Square again. This is a repeat of last Saturday’s fixture which resulted in a narrow victory to College.  Wakatu do not have any players with rep commitments so they will rate their chances to reverse last week’s result.  Big flanker Fergus Hughes will be particularly hungry against his school mates.

Although they are struggling in the TPL, Wanderers/Motueka are one for one in this competition.  They travel in to the Botanics to take on ACOB.  ACOB have four players away with the Nelson team.  The Zohrab brothers, Josh Simpson and Felix Murray are all bona fide all – rounders and will all be difficult to replace.  The visitors however may be more heavily hit, for although they only lose two players, they probably do not possess the club strength that ACOB boasts.  Losing their pro Max Mannering will be a severe setback for Wanderers/Motueka as he is their key performer with both bat and ball.  ACOB retain Jake Milton who is producing the goods week in and week out and veteran Reuben Smith is truly having a golden summer as he is revisiting his youth. ACOB’s depth should see them through here.

A buoyant WTTU welcome Stoke/Nayland to Jubilee Park on the back of a couple of very good performances.  Sam Baxendine is in menacing form with the ball and Joey O’Connor is in a rich vein of form with the bat.  They are well acclimatised to the conditions at Jubilee so there is no reason their exploits should be curtailed now.  WTTU lose regular keeper Jack Aldridge and opening bowler Josh Newport plus sometime batsman Greg Hay, so it will be a chance for others to display their wares.  The belligerent Tom Cross is about due to produce another longer innings. Car Company Stoke Nayland suffered a rare defeat last week so will be smarting.  They also have an opening bowler, Ben Stark, out but should be able to overcome this.  Stoke Nayland took a severely depleted team over the hill last week, but will welcome back the likes of Darius Skeaping, Chris Dittmer and Tim O’Connor.  Bad boy Paddy Howes has also served his suspension so he will no doubt be looking to gain redemption from his teammates. This should be a very interesting encounter.

Matches begin at 11 am.