| Home | Honour Roll | Life Members | Club History | Club Records | OWZATT | Coming Events | Shop | Contact Us |
About Baulko
Web Site designed by |
Our season started really well with four wins in a row - Cougars by 6 wickets (M Walters 66* & D Cope 4/51), Kings Langley by 25 runs (A Flannery 65, M Gadow 45 & D Fletcher 4/36), Wenty Leagues by 5 wickets (M Walters 84*) and by 3 runs against the Tamils, however this was where the wins ended until round 13 with a 4 wicket win against Guildford Leagues (A Flannery 48). Round 8 at Charles McLaughlin was washed out. Our 8 losses did contain some brilliant individual performances:- D Jessop 68 V AKA, A Flannery 117 V KL, M Gadow 53 V WL, M Walters 109 V Tamils and R Cope 6/67 V GL however, they were alone on their day. A comparison to all other teams in our grade shows we were on par with our bowling (Our Ave 20.42 V Comp Ave 20.22), but is was our batting that let us down (Our Ave 15.98 V Comp Ave 20.02). That roughly equates to an extra 40 runs per innings. If this was added to all our batting total(s), we could have won an extra 2 games and been far more competitive in several others. Those extra points would have been enough to secure a semi spot. Even with our record of 5-1-8, the competition was that tight between 3rd - 7th that a first innings win, rather than an outright loss in our last game would have seen us equal on points for fourth spot and coming down to quotients to decide our fate! We were not helped by a few issues in our quest for runs. Missing key men, sometimes for a few games at a time was difficult, affecting mainly the older brigade (ie the over 30's) due to illness, injury or family / work commitments, occasionally playing with less than eleven, losing the toss on 40 degree days, poor batting and catching efforts or sometimes just not being good enough didn't help! Our main home ground (Ted Horwood 2) too was a distinct disadvantage to our team and a contributing factor to our low scores. When we arrived for our first TH2 home game against the Tamils (round 4, 21/10/06) we found the ground had been topsoiled!! Not a sandy based topsoil that would settle down quickly but tonnes and tonnes of chook poo (not to mention the smell!!). With the hot / humid conditions and copious amounts of water council applied, this had made the ground perfect for…....soccer!! Was the club aware of councils topsoiling plan so early in the season? TH2 remained lush for the rest of the season. This is a shame too because the club had outlaid plenty for a new synthetic pitch and the ground having all the amenities as well as being within close proximity to the club - all the features that you would want in a home ground. We played 5 games / batted 6 innings at TH2. In 5 of these innings we were bowled out for less than 100. The sixth innings, the second innings of our last game, we managed 113. The only way to score runs on this sponge was to have the patience of Boycott or the eye of Gilchrist, neither of which we have. This comment is "franked" when our opposition could only manage once an individual score of 50 or more (61) at TH2 in these five games. That innings, in our last game after we had lost on first innings, was a result of clean hitting rather than safer ground strokes that would have suited our batting style far better. Yeah sure there was some poor batting however, it was borne out of frustration for not getting value for shots along the ground. Compare this to our two wins from three games at Charles McLaughlin and this only adds to our frustration. Yes, our opposition too had to bat there but their hitting was cleaner or our catching was poorer. Generally a combination of the two! Needless to say that we will be on the lookout for another home ground next season where we might be able to get better value for runs. The bowling honours were taken out by….me, with 26 wickets at a tick under 16... but that was more a sign of my availability. If we had have been able to get a few more games out of Richard Cope (22 wickets @ 16 - missed two games) and Dan Fletcher (15 wickets @ 16 - missed four games) then this result would have been far closer. The batting award deservedly goes to Mitch Walters with 409 runs @ 34. An honourable mention goes to Anthony Flannery with 336 @ 28, mainly facing the new ball. Not surprisingly, Mitch and Anthony were our only two "centurions" this season. Well done gents! The most catches went to our 'keeper Scott Thorn with 13 as well as 2 stumpings, closely followed by his first slip partner Anthony Flannery with 10. Thorny had missed a couple of games during the season as well, mainly through an injury from the "Baulko V Bankstown" match. During those games, there were at least 7 catches to our substitute keepers, so he could have got 20! Well kept this year Thorny. Oh well, another off season to ponder what could have been but more importantly, what hopefully, will be next season. See you all then.
David Cope
Individual Awards
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||