Basil McBurney wins for Northland, Poverty Bay and Hamilton

Published on 17 Feb 2020

There were wins for Northland, Poverty Bay and Hamilton in round four of the Basil McBurney Trophy played over the weekend.

Counties Manukau and Poverty Bay travelled to Blake Park in Tauranga for their match, which got off to a fast start with Counties' Sam Varcoe dismissed first ball of the game by Andrew Gibbs.

This set the tone for the Counties Manukau innings, as they struggled to build momentum, scoring at just a tick over three an over and losing wickets at regular intervals, being dismissed for 124 in the 41st over.

The bowlers shared the wickets, each of the six used all claiming at least one, with Graham Hudson, Drew Brierley and Parminder Kulaar grabbing two apiece; Kulaar finishing with figures of 2-2.

Counties would have been hopeful of pulling off the unlikely when they took early wickets to have Poverty Bay 21/2, but Kulaar backed-up his performance with the ball, navigating Poverty Bay out of early trouble before he was dismissed for 40.

It was a case of when, not if, at this point for Poverty Bay, and 48 from Sam Kershaw nearly guided them home, but he was dismissed two runs shy of victory, leaving the duties of finishing the game off to Thomas Hayes and Brierley, who secured a five-wicket victory.

There was another big win when Hamilton visited Bay Oval to face Bay of Plenty, with Hamilton emerging victorious by 108 runs.

Hamilton opener Callum Hill set the platform for his side with a composed 72; the other batsmen providing cameos without kicking-on to big scores, with six passing 20 as Hamilton completed their 50 overs at 267/8.

Bay of Plenty bowler Josh Earle would have been satisfied with his afternoon's work, finishing with figures of 4-49.

Bay of Pletny's chase started positively as Jacob Logan and Taylor Bettelhiem reached a half-century partnership, but the run out of Logan (44) with the score at 81 began Bay of Plenty's downfall, with Bettelhiem departing 11 balls later fir 34.

No other batsman really got going for Bay of Plenty and, a promising start came to an abrupt end as they were bowled out for 159; Ryan Smith returning classy figures of 4-30.

The final game of the round saw Northland play Waikato Valley at Kensington Park, and the hosts restricted Waikato Valley to 205/8 from their 50 with some tight bowling led by Dave Armitt, who finished with figures of 3-28.

Northland's chase got off to a fast start with Tom Lovegrove and Bert Horner scoring 71 runs at a good clip, but when they were both dismissed, and Rhys Jones followed them shortly after, Northland's good start was erased as a good Waikato Valley comeback had Northland 89/3.

Fortunately for Northland, Byron Jollivet and Mark Andrianatos combined for a 74-run fourth-wicket partnership to take the game away from Waikato Valley and, when Adrianatos was dismissed for 36, Caleb Boswell-Smith strode to the middle to hit the winning runs, with Jollivet finishing unbeaten on 71.