Depleted Lions savage Bears

SHRUGGING off the loss of suspended pitching ace Brad Egan and delivering a remarkable show of offensive power with a seven-spot in the bottom of the second, Guild brought a shuddering end to Bellarine’s season with a thumping 10-5 win in the Geelong Baseball Association A-grade preliminary final on Saturday.

Cleanly struck line drives by the first three Guild hitters were ominous, although they amounted to nought and it was the Bears who gained a break — in the top of the second — when a Simon Murry single, a Lachlan Stott walk and a sacrifice bunt set the table for Chris Barker to swat a two-RBI single.

While that blow would have given Bellarine encouragement, the excitement dissipated quickly — after Ryan Stewart doubled to lead off the equaliser for Guild and initiated a chain of offence that included a fielder’s choice, a HBP, an RBI walk, a Jordan Lekkas infield hit, a Jarryd Wood sacrifice fly, a Jarrod Durston RBI single and a Tony Kilfoyle walk to load the bases with two out and four already scored off Bears starter Lachlan Hockey.

A productive foray was bloated further when Stewart — coming to bat for a second time — tugged a basesclearing triple into the right field corner against a stunned Bellarine outfit that had gone from chocolates to boiled lollies in a trice before summoning Murry from right field to mop up on the hill.

With Guild starter James Wood settling into his work to spin four ensuing scoreless frames, Troy Snarey, Chris Durston, Lekkas (sacrifice fly) and Wood (RBI single) combined in the fifth to stretch the Guild lead to seven, seemingly more than enough to ice the contest, although the Bears had other ideas — conjuring three runs in the seventh as Barker (double), Brock Wells (triple) and Lewis Weldon all hit safely.

A sacrifice fly by Harry Levy in the seventh gave the Lions a further buffer before Wood closed out the game with two innings of scoreless work that assured the Lions of another crack at Newport Rams in the grand final on Saturday.

While both clubs played solid defence and Bellarine matched Guild on hits (11 to the Lions’ 12), the damage was done in that one frenetic half-innings, when the Lions made the very most of their scoring opportunities against a shell-shocked opponent that was unable to recover from the onslaught.

Stewart (two hits and three RBIs) was an inspiration with the stick for Guild, who had other grand contributors in Chris Durston (three hits), Lekkas (two hits and two ribbies), Snarey (two hits) and Levy (two RBIs), while Barker (two and two), Wells (two and one), Weldon (two and one) and Matt Sage (two hits) were very good for Bellarine.

Carding the win for Guild, Wood was accorded fine support by Durston in the set-up role before 16-year-old Wood collected the save in another superb all-round individual effort that has characterised his winter season as one of the league’s outstanding young players.

Qualifying for another Agrade grand final appearance — its 10th on the trot — Guild again demonstrated its club spirit and resilience against the odds, while Bellarine will be bitterly disappointed to have come up short of the ultimate team prize after promising so much in recent years.