Western Zone was left disappointed after Monday’s loss at Tamworth but coach Matt Tabbernor feels his side still has a chance to succeed at the NSW Country Colts Championship.
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Western’s batting was the issue in the round one game against Riverina, the talent-stacked side rolled for just 137.
Riverina was cruising at 1-66 in reply but spin twins Brock Larance and Marty Jeffrey put the brakes on and got Western back in the contest.
But there wasn’t enough runs on the board and Riverina won by five wickets with 5.1 overs remaining.
“It was very disappointing,” Tabbernor said.
“We just didn’t bat well enough. We were probably 20 or 30 runs short of putting pressure no them and that showed in the end.”
A couple of dropped catches also hurt Western’s chances.
So often at NSW Country Cricket tournaments, a loss on day one can all but signal the end of a side’s hopes of success.
But with Illawarra scoring a surprise win over Newcastle in the game of the pool, there is still hope.
“The positive we’ve got is that Illawarra beat Newcastle so we’ve still got things in our hands if we beat Illawarra tomorrow (Tuesday).
“We can still be in the mix.”
If Western is to beat Illawarra and Newcastle bounces back against Riverina, it could all come down to the final day when Tabbernor’s men meet the Novocastrians.
Tabbernor stated his side may have set their goals of a possible total too high after Ben Knaggs won the toss and elected to bat on Monday.
Jeffrey (16) and Bathurst’s Nic Broes (9) departed early and when Henry Railz (0) fell Western was in trouble at 3-35.
Larance showed glimpses of his attacking quality when hitting four boundaries in his knock of 26 from 20 balls but it was left to Thomas Nelson (30) to hold the innings together.
Fletcher Rose chimed in with a late 10 not out to help add some respect to the total but it was always going to be a challenge to defend 137.
That challenge got even more difficult when quicks Luke Powell and Railz failed to make serious inroads into the Riverina line-up.
But Larance and Jeffrey tightened things up and gave Western a glimmer of hope.
“Brock with ball, he and Marty both bowled their 10 straight and didn’t go for 40 between them so they did very well,” Tabbernor said.
Larance finished with 2-21 from his 10 while Jeffrey took 1-15.
Railz (1-15) was the only other wicket-taker as Angus McLay (21 not out) guided Riverina to a hard-fought victory.
