By Damian Ford
This week Montrose Cricket Club saw the emergence of a quality young player, Aden Bates 100* (127 balls) in our under 16s v Kilsyth. A gutsy performance in hot morning conditions Aden was in early at 1-15 and took it up to a quality Kilsyth attack. Only really supported with the bat by Flynn Dexter 28 the boys unfortunately fell 31 runs short of the 228 set by Kilsyth. Congratulations to Aden on his first 100 as a Montrose Junior.
The under 14s led by captain Lincoln Walker got their first win for the season with a dominating performance at home over Norwood. The runs were shared with Lincoln Walker getting 38* and Chris Muller 23* with the team finishing 6/197 winning by 4 wickets.
The seniors had mixed results with the 1st XI losing to Ainslie Park after posting 266 last week. The 2nd XI continued their dominance of the Pascoe Shield passing the 126 set by Ainslie Park down and finished the day 5/229. The highlight was Blake Podesta’s first senior hundred, finishing with 101 not out off 94 balls. The 3rd XI fell short to a good team in Norwood losing by 2 wickets. The standouts with the ball Daniel Crowe 4/49 and Max Cron 3/43. The 4th XI had a great win, Brad Felstead leading from the front as captain with ball and bat with another not out (averaging 51 for the season) and 2 wickets (leg stump specialist). The 5th XI and 6th XI both posted good wins with highlights coming from Cam Day 74, Nick Day 55. Steele Gardam (12 years old) getting his first senior wickets 2/24. Charli Stevens 50* and Paul Muller 40*.
The Women’s team posted another great win chasing down Yarra Junctions 79 in 15 overs with Charli Stevens staring with the bat 30* off 18 balls and Keltie Blake getting 2/0 off 3 overs.
With the 1s, 2s, 5s, 6s and women’s teams all in the top 4 the push to Christmas and being in contention at the turn is the focus. The 3s and 4s only on the fringe, hopefully by Christmas we can have all seven teams in the final’s spots.
Junior highlight of the week, outside of Aden Bates’ first 100 we had Corey Wallis star with the ball in the under 12s. Opening the bowling and getting 5/16 off his 4 overs is a remarkable effort from the young fella. Congratulations Corey on being the Junior highlight of the week.
