No joy as girls lose a thriller

FOUR runs to win from the final ball against MackayWhitsundays was the heartbreaking margin North Queensland fell short on the opening day of competition.

The Saturday afternoon fixture against Townsville’s nearest southern neighbour went down to the wire in a T20 thriller the locals just lost at Gill Park.

North Queensland was 2-106 chasing 116 as the final over began but flipped its chances at victory when Kate Teichmann thumped four runs from the second ball.

That gave the locals four balls to score six required.

After a dot ball, Teichmann was bowled for 23, then Summer Christopher was run out attempting to convert a single into two runs, leaving North Queensland 4-112 with one ball remaining.

Lily Chittenden was left an unenviable task with her first ball faced of the match: to hit three runs to tie or a boundary for the victory.

Central Queensland’s Kiana Dunn held her nerve with the ball.

She restricted the North Queenslanders to a single and her side won by three runs.

Jessica O’connor batted valiantly at the top of the NQ order to hit a tournamenthigh 40 runs.

North Queensland went down by 66 runs to eventual champion CQ on Saturday morning but rebounded to defeat rivals Far North Queensland by 25 runs on Sunday.

Amayah Hague (4-17) and Lily Audas-gray (3-9) held FNQ to 80 before a team effort surpassed the total.

O’connor was Townsville’s leading runscorer with 72 across the campaign.

Hague (8-57 from 18.0) was the side’s leading bowler while Audas-gray (6-55 from 15.0) and Chelsie Stanley (4-36 from 9.0) also stood up to be counted when handed the ball.