It was a long time coming but City United finally recaptured that winning feeling on Saturday.
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Chasing down Bective East’s 6-171, City notched their first win since the opening round of the 2015/2016 season.
“We’ve been working hard for it and it’s great to reap the rewards straight away,” skipper Brad Smith said.
Watching on from the sidelines Smith admitted he was a bit nervous as the overs ticked away.
“But I had full confidence the boys could get the job done,” he said.
And they did, Ross Steyn (52no) and new English recruit Aaron Howard (23no) combining for an unbroken 43 run partnership to guide City to 6-173 off 38 overs.
Steyn had some work to when he went out with City over 100 runs in arrears.
“I was a bit disappointed one of the top four couldn’t go on with it,” Smith said.
He (20), Tom Fitzgerald (21) and Scott Brennan (16) all got starts.
Bective did have one of their top four make a good score, with Toby Whale falling just one run shy of his half-century. Expecting some big things from the teenager this season, skipper Adam Jones said he batted well.
“He batted extremely well, got us off to a good start. It was just unfortunate that he got out,” he said.
“If he could have gone on for a bit longer we might have got that extra 30 runs that we probably needed.”
Ben Halliday (22no) and Dan Brannan (22no) also did well at the end to get them to 171, which Jones thought was a winnable total if they did a good job in the field.
“(But) We dropped a few catches at crucial times, and crucial players,” he said.
They dropped Steyn when City still needed about 40.
Jones was generally happy with how they bowled, Gerhard Labushagne, Aaron Madirazza and Ben Halliday three he mentioned.
After conceding over 500 runs in their first two games last season, Smith was delighted to keep Bective to 171 and said they knew the job was half done.
Brennan (2-21), Anoop Nair (2-37) and Lachie Cooke (1-35) particularly did a great job with the ball. They were well backed up by the fielders with the boundaries kept to a minimum, Smith said.