WCC U13s Control Game to Reach Semi Finals
Watsonians Under 13s beat Carlton at Westwoods on Sunday by 25 runs and qualify for the semi final in two weeks time.
Watsonians batted first and scored 289 whilst losing only 5 wickets, the first of these not coming until the ninth over. Jamie Cousin and Rory Evans opened up steadily with a partnership of 18 followed by the pairings of James Kidd/Calum Young and Andrew Cockburn/Alasdair Middleton, each pair adding an excellent 28 runs to the total.
The final pairing of Adam Hastings and Murray Blair provided some explosive hitting, scoring 36 runs in 3 overs but lost 4 wickets on the way thus reducing their score to 16 and taking the final total to a very well compiled 289.
If we bowled and fielded well, it was going to be very difficult for Carlton to score the runs as they were under pressure from the start to keep the scoreboard ticking over. In the first over, Adam Hastings took a wicket with the first ball of the innings and that was immediately followed by a fantastic double wicket maiden by Alasdair Middleton who was making his debut for the side. With only 2 runs coming off the third over by Jamie Cousin, Carlton were on the back foot immediately.
The next 6 overs saw some good controlled bowling with wickets falling every second over. Needing to score 49 off their last three overs was always going to be too much for Carlton and Jamie Cousin wrapped the match up with 2 more wickets in the final over with the final total reaching 264.
This was a very well organised victory for the boys who looked in control of the game from the very start. Once again, the number of wickets lost and taken was the deciding factor – Watsonians lost 5 wickets and Carlton lost 9 wickets which at minus 5 runs for each wicket equals a difference of 20 runs, very close to the winning margin.
We will find out we are playing after next week’s round of matches and look forward to another strong performance from the team.
