OXFORD Centennials will find themselves in a familiar situation when they return to the crease this Saturday, following the opening day of their Bathurst District Cricket Association first grade match with Bathurst City on the weekend.
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Josh Toole’s side will resume at 6-71, needing another 49 for victory, after Redbacks were kept to just 119 batting first at Morse Park 1.
A late flurry of wickets to Jarrod Urza saw Ox-Cents lose 6-37, including the key wicket of Toole in the last over before stumps, leaving Aaron Seymour (nought) and Blake Aubin (three not out) as the batsmen to pick things up on day two.
Toole was delighted with his team’s bowling effort – but not so pleased with what came after it in the top-of-the-table showdown.
“We were going along pretty nicely. We got a 34-run stand out of Kesh [Pillai] and Andrew Brown and then Tom Loader came in at three and made 21 so we were looking solid but fell apart pretty badly,” the skipper said.
“My shot was one of the dumbest things I’ve ever done in cricket.”
Urza finished the day with 4-15 and, on the back of Cohen Schubert’s recent bag of five wickets, he showed the extra depth that Redbacks have added to their bowling.
Earlier though, it was Ox-Cents who were dictating terms with the ball.
Redbacks got away to a good start, thanks to Greg Adams and Joey Coughlan, but when they fell for 15 and 22 respectively, things started to turn sour.
It wasn’t through a lack of effort on Redbacks’ part, given that they soaked up 55 overs for their 119.
Matt Willis (16) tried to dig in, as did Shabbir Dhamani (27), but none of them could get on top of the opposition.
As he has done all season, Aaron Seymour led the way up front, taking 3-14 off 20 overs, going at 0.7 runs per over.
But he wasn’t a one-man show, as Toole picked up 2-37 at first change, while Jamie Wicks produced his best display of the season in picking up 4-23 from 12.
“We bowled really well, very tight lines all day and ‘Billy’ [Seymour] and Wicksy were both extremely hard to get away,” Toole said.
“Redbacks played pretty patiently. They took their time and, obviously, given the amount of wickets that fell, the pitch was doing a fair bit, but we were happy to roll them for that score.”
As precarious as their position with the bat currently is, Ox-Cents can take some heart from the fact that they have been in a similar situation three times already during the two-day games and have won each time.
Against ORC, City Colts and St Pat’s Old Boys, top-order collapses were made redundant by lower-order fightbacks and, with Seymour at the crease and in the form of his career, they are close enough to have some confidence.
“Billy has been outstanding with the bat all season, and Blake is due for a score. We’re less than 50 away so I have no doubt we can get there,” Toole said. “Hopefully we have a lot of sunshine this week and the deck is a little bit easier to bat on.”
