The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Leask: Premier return will be struggle
Aberdeen side facing some hard work
Former Stoneywood-Dyce allrounder Michael Leask has backed the Granite City men to shake off their struggles and return to the top flight of Scottish cricket, but only if they put in a huge amount of hard work.
Leask, now aiming for a regular first-team place at Somerset, delivered his verdict as the Peoples Park club looked ahead to life in the Strathmore Union in the wake of a winless season in the Eastern Premier.
The whitewashwascompleted on Saturday in Edinburgh as they suffered a record-breaking defeat by newly crowned champions Carlton.
Leask, whofaced Stoneywood-Dyce during a brief return to Forfarshire earlier this month, said: “There were a lot of mixed emotions when I played against my former club at Forthill and it was very sad to see them in their current Aberdeenshire’s summer of discontent came to a satisfactory end on Saturday as Chris Venske’s side produced an efficient display to win at Arbroath.
Having completed just 10 of a scheduled 17 matches – fewer than any side in the Eastern Premier before Saturday – Shire may have felt as if their campaign was just beginning.
Instead, it concluded with their fifth win of the season, prevailing by 47 runs against an Arbroath side which finished one place and just one percentage point above them. state. The picture looked gloomy and they made it hard to imagine they will get back to their previous standard in the short term.
“But anything is possible if an enormous amount of hard work is put in and theykeepontrying to bring the talented youngsters through. Ihopethey canrecover their status as soon as possible.”
There was certainly no slackening off by Carlton at Grange Loan. Their tally of 388 for five was a competition best, all the more remarkable after they had been 14 for two.
Rory McCann (75) and Gordon Drummond (81) lit the blue touch paper with Mario Olivier (105 not out) and Hugo Southwell (94 not out) providing the real fireworks. Their expresspaced stand was worth 195 before Cheeky Gosain grabbed a six-wicket haul to sent Stoneywood-Dyce sliding to 163 all out.
Captain Venske feared the worst after his side had posted a modest 158 all out. He said: “I said to the playerswhenIwonthe tossand elected to bat that we had the chance to make about 300 because it looked a really good deck. It was a good pitch to bat on but we kept getting out to poor shots and at half-time I thought we were at least 100 runs short. But we made up for it with all our bowlers doing really well.”
Venske helped set the platform for that substantial total he was targeting by scoring 37 at a run-a-ball in an opening stand of 64 with Callum Howard. However, it was Howard who anchored an innings that lost its way as Arbroath’s bowlers stuck to their task and enjoyed success at regular intervals. Shire lost five wickets for just 15 runs and looked as if they might cave-in, while Calvin Burnett helped himself to four wickets. Leftarm spinner Craig Ramsay also claimed four, includingVenske andHoward, although not before Shire’s leading scorer had made a vital 63.
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The opener faced 102 deliveries and was ninth out as the visitors had to be content with a total of 158, having failed to use more than 12 of their overs. That proved to be amuch better effort than the one produced by the home batsmen, who were dismissed for 111 in just 31.4 overs.
All the Shire bowlers contributed to the success, Dale Sweeney starring with three for 19, while there were two wickets each for Tyler Buchan, Etienne Botha and Harsha Cooray.
Venske added: “It’s good to end the season with a win.” England’s cricketers have established their one-day dominance against Pakistan and Ben Stokes is ready to make life even harder for the tourists as he resumes allround duties.
After sharing the spoils in the Test series this summer England are well ahead in the 50-over format, going 2- 0 up with three to play in the series after straightforward victories at the Ageas Bowl and Lord’s on Saturday. While Pakistan’s options appear to be diminishing, opener Mohammad Hafeez having withdrawn from
the squad through injury, the hosts can look forward to adding another string to their bow for the final three games.
Stokes has been playing as a specialist batsman due toacalfproblembut ishoping rejoin the pace attack at Trent Bridge tomorrow.
“The plan from the start was to be fit and ready to bowl by the third game
“All of the build-up work I needed to do has been done”
and, by the way things are going, it looks likely I’ll be an option for Eoin if needed,” he said.
“I’ve done all the prep to get myself fit and put my hand up to say I am ready to bowl.
“I’ve bowled for about 15 minutes flat out and all the build-up work I needed to do has been done, so if I am needed Eoin will ask.”
Stokes thrives on being centre stage – be it batting, bowling or fielding.
While he concedes having a reduced workload has been frustrating, the Durham man has been trying to make it up to his team-mates by giving more in the remaining facets of the game.
“It’s so boring,” he said of being denied the ball. “It makes the fielding innings seem a lot longer because if I bowl 10 overs it kind of takes 20 overs out of the game. But I pridemyself on my fielding and what keeps me switched on is that I don’t want to give away runs.”