Champs digging for opening round points
CRICKET: As clubs approach day two of the rain-affected opening round of the TCI Agrade fixtures, defending premiers Northern Brothers are among the best placed teams to snatch a result.
The Diggers opened the bowling against University and managed to hold their opponents to 6/102 as they look to claim first innings points.
Northern Brothers president Ben Hilsdon said after working into a strong position, he expected the Diggers to come out aggressively to push for maximum points.
“They did what they could in the overs played,” he said.
“The team has been playing pretty consistently, and to have University in the position they are, considering the rain, it’s a good spot to be in going into the second day.
“They’ll go out pretty hard early on to try and roll the next four wickets. If they can score some runs pretty quickly they might get a chance to try and take a few wickets and get as many points as possible.”
Their task will be made more difficult with Chris Hall and Kris Glass on representative duties, as well as no Kieran Gibbs.
They will be replaced by Gavin Steger, Cody Walker and young player Todd Hamlet.
In the weekend’s other fixtures, Western Districts will be hoping to take early wickets in their encounter with Metropolitan-Easts.
Currently the Trojans are effectively 4/106 with the retirement of Liam Brown and will be looking to post a first innings total big enough to defend.
That will be the mindset of Highfields-Railways who currently find themselves behind the eight-ball against Southern Districts.
They sit at 4/47 and need their lower order to stand tall to avoid conceding first innings points.