Magpies hold their nerve to secure first victory
Souths hold their nerve in a thriller
Southern Districts has completed a successful return to top-flight cricket after claiming victory in round four of the Harding-Madsen Shield on Saturday.
After going winless in their first two games back, the Magpies produced a captivating nine-run victory over Metropolitan-Easts.
Souths opened the batting and posted a lofty 8-268 courtesy of 135 from opener Aaron Paul.
In response the Trojans kept wickets in hand, but couldn’t reach the total, finishing their 50 overs at 4-258.
“It’s a great result for the club. We’re still in the stages in stages of rebuilding,” Southern Districts president Stephen Bowles said.
“We’ve got a lot of young players coming into grade and senior players putting their hands up to mentor them.
“We’ve had mixed results but the A-grade team has been quite competitive.
“They’ve been in contention in all three games and have learnt from a few close losses and taken positives out of every match.
“Hopefully there’ll be a few more wins along the way.”
While taking the time to celebrate the win, Bowles said they weren’t getting carried away with the result.
“It’s a good result for the effort the boys have put in at training in the months before and with the delays to the start of the season,” he said.
“We all knew it wasn’t going to be a walk in the park, but it’s always nice to see a result like this for the hard work put in.”
No Toowoomba side will make the finals from Pool A after top two teams Central Districts
and Laidley both produced key victories.
Central scraped home to a four-run victory over the Northsiders, while University’s hopes ended after they were
unable to chase down the 281 run total posted by Laidley, falling by 41 runs.
Western Suburbs all-but secured their spot in the finals courtesy of a 27-run defeat of Brothers.
Matt Hallas continued his blistering form for the season, top scoring with 69 runs and producing game-best bowling figures of 3-23 from his six overs with the ball.
In other Pool B matches, Highfields Railways came away with a 23-run defeat of the South East Redbacks.
Northern Brothers Diggers maintained their hot form with the bat with an 87-run win over Lockyer.