Weather forces call-off
Published 11 Jul 2011 12:00
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GREENOCK 1st XI had yet another empty weekend as their league match with Grange was called off mid-Saturday morning.
The hosts were confident their ground would be fit for play following the heavy rain that hit the capital on Friday.
But the Edinburgh side's ground, Raeburn Place, is the venue for this week's tri-series of one-day internationals featuring Scotland, Ireland and Sri Lanka.
And with a forecast for Saturday afternoon of further heavy showers, Cricket Scotland were understandably extremely reluctant to allow Greenock's game to go ahead.
As it transpired, the forecasters were spot on and further rain did hit Edinburgh on Saturday afternoon.
Only one league game started in the area, at nearby Goldenacre, but the rain caused play to be suspended after just 26 overs and the game was eventually abandoned without any further action.
So it can be argued that the right decision was reached, if a little prematurely.
It should be noted that Grange do not normally play home fixtures before international matches at Raeburn Place but on this occasion the dates for these ODIs were only confirmed after the season's league fixtures had been announced.
Grange have asked the Greenock fixture be replayed at a later date and it is expected that this request will be discussed at a meeting of the Competitions Management Group on Wednesday.
Three games in the Premiership did go ahead on Saturday and the bonus for Greenock was that, without playing themselves, the nuances of the percentage system used to determine league positions meant that they advanced one place up the table to 11th position due to Dunfermline losing heavily to Aberdeenshire.
Stirling County won their second game in a row to climb off bottom spot but Ayr slumped to second-bottom place as a result of their defeat by Arbroath United.
Greenock's next league fixture is on Saturday at Glenpark when they take on Watsonians, who have enjoyed a somewhat mixed season to date but who will definitely present a stern challenge to Greenock.
Before that though, the team have two midweek cup games to be played.
On Tuesday, Kelburne are the opposition at Glenpark for a first-round tie in the Murgitroyd Rowan Cup while on Thursday, Greenock travel to Ayr for their final sectional game in the West League Cup.
Last week, two games were played in this competition, resulting in a win over Ferguslie and a defeat to Renfrew.
These results mean Greenock will probably need to defeat Ayr if they wish to make further progress in the competition.
Meanwhile, the sun shone brightly for the Tall Ships in Greenock on Saturday so, for the first time this season, Glenpark had the luxury of playing a home game on a summer's day, with a final score of Glenpark 239 all out, Bothwell 191 all out.
An injury to Mark Robertson meant Dave Sharma was asked to skipper again.
This time he had a much stronger team to lead to victory against Bothwell, but not everything went the home team's way - starting with losing the toss and being asked to bat.
Neil Flack opened with Shilesh Prabhu and, for the second week running, got the team off to a good start with a half-century stand.
He was replaced by Phil McIntosh, who joined Prabhu for a superb second-wicket partnership of 115 off 15 overs. Both players deservedly posted half-centuries and it looked as if they would put the game out of Bothwell's reach.
However McIntosh's dismissal led to a swift decline for the second half of the innings. Alex Baum made batting look easy, but wickets fell regularly at the other end.
Things came to an abrupt halt in the 46th over as Waleed Jamal played an inauspicious shot facing his second delivery for the club, and was clean bowled, leaving Alex stranded at the other end.
It was a respectable score of 239, but probably 50 less than would have been hoped for at the halfway stage.
Sharma and debutante Jamal opened the bowling for Glenpark, and both struggled with their line, though Dave did manage to remove both openers. McIntosh came on to replace Jamal after a couple of overs and also had early success.
After their early wickets the Bothwell batsmen began to consolidate and reached 20 overs with no further losses. This prompted a double change as Kenny Diffenthal replaced Jamal and Greg McDougall replaced McIntosh, who was struggling with a calf injury. Although both bowled economically when Bothwell were looking to accelerate, it was McDougall's spell that turned the game. He bowled his ten overs straight through, returning figures of 4-31.
Jeeta Singh continued the good work as the visitors fell further and further behind the required rate. There was a sting in the tail as some lusty blows were struck by the ninth-wicket pair, but Jamal then came back on to blast out the last two wickets.
For once the bowlers were backed up in the field as no catches were dropped. Kenny took two excellent ones off hard-hit shots, keeper Alex took a pair and Dave and Shilesh also chipped in with one apiece.
The win leaves Glenpark well placed in the table, but with the likes of Partick and Meikleriggs still ahead, there is still a lot of work to do. Next week the team go to Poloc where hopefully their form will continue.
l Glenpark 239ao (45.3 overs) S Prabhu 65, P McIntosh 59, A Baum 39*. Bothwell 191ao (48.4 overs) G McDougall 4-31, D Sharma 2-10, W Jamal 2-30. Glenpark won by 48 runs. Glenpark receive 12 points and Bothwell five points.
This article appeared in Greenock Telegraph 11 Jul 11
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