Harper Sercombe
Hoppers Crossing is back to its best in the Victorian Sub-District Cricket Association.
Last week the Cats’ five game winning streak was cut by Yarraville, however, a strong performance with the bat against Cobutg on Saturday has meant a losing streak doesn’t begin.
After winning the toss and batting the Cats were away to a shaky start, finding themselves at 1-3. However, it was fairly smooth sailing from then on. A 139 run partnership between opener and captain-coach Simon Lambert and Shijit Chandran Poovathingal at three, really got the Cats’ innings moving.
The Cats ended up on 6-273 from their 45 overs, with Lambert’s 91 the best score. With the ball, the Cats didn’t give Coburg a look in, with five early wickets. Coburg finished at 10-174 from 41.1 overs.
“It was really pleasing yesterday to put a big score on the board after last week,” Lambert said.
“It was bitterly disappointing last week to not chase down 160 at Yarraville on a pretty good pitch, we were bitterly disappointed with how that went. So to hit back with a big score in the first innings yesterday was really pleasing and it was always going to be a tough task for Coburg to get close.
“We’ve been very good with the ball all season and the games we’ve lost, our batting has let us down. We’ve struggled to put meaningful contributions consistently in the top six.
“We’ve lost a lot of wickets quickly at times, so for everyone in that top six to put on a meaningful contribution yesterday, was really pleasing. It shows what we can do when we put it together, and hopefully we can find a bit more consistency in that top six because if we can we’ll be pretty hard to beat.
“If we bat like that every week, the bowling side of the game becomes fairly irrelevant. So if we can do that every week, our bowling will take care of itself.
“It was good for the seamers to take three or four early wickets and put them right on the back foot. From there, they were never going to get the score.
“We’re capable of batting teams out of games and that’s what we’ve got to keep doing. Hopefully guys can take some confidence from this and carry it into next week and the next few weeks.”
Next week, the Cats return to two-ball cricket for a pivotal clash against Preston. The Cats sit just two points behind Preston on the ladder.
“We’ve got a two-day game coming up next week which should suit our batting lineup with a bit more time,” Lambert said.
“We’ve got a lot of guys who just like to bat, so that should suit them.
“If you have two bad games, all of a sudden you’re a long way off. So we’ve just got to keep winning and hope the teams around you start losing.
“At the moment it’s all to play for and you’ve just got to keep winning.”
