Tara Murray
Hoppers Crossing’s achilles heel flared at the wrong time as the Cats were knocked out of the Victorian Sub-District Cricket Association north-west.
The Cats batting has been up and down all season and they needed a good performance if they were to knock off Kew.
Cats captain-coach Simon Lambert was left thinking what might have been.
“It wasn’t ideal and we’re disappointed obviously,” he said. “We felt like we had the team to beat in the competition.
“Our batting has cost us all year and proved to be the case again. We got what we deserved and we’re disappointed as we didn’t produce what we know we can for large parts of the season.”
The Cats were sent in on Saturday with Lambert saying they would have bowled first as well.
He said they needed to get through the first hour then the pitch would start to settle and build a decent score from there.
The Cats though got off to a poor start, with their top three batters all back in the sheds by the score was 11.
They soon crumbled even further, with the score 5-42.
The Cats lower order showed a bit of resistance and were able to push the score past 100.
A score of more than 150 was looking likely at one point, before the Cats lost their last three wickets for just three, to be bowled out for 147 in the 63rd.
Fawad Ahmed was the standout with the bat for the Cats, making 62. Abbas Faiyaz, who finished 28 not out, was the only other batter to make more than 20.
With something to defend, Lambert said they were hopeful their bowling attack could get the job done.
He said they were expecting the pitch to crumble a bit, but instead produced the best batting conditions he had seen all season.
“It didn’t move for the seamers and it didn’t spin for the spinners,” he said. “I’m surprised we got as close as we did.
“The conditions changed from the first day to the second day. Had we bowled first it could have been significantly different.”
The Cats bowlers started well and had Kew in trouble at 4-14 as the visitors had worked their way back into the game.
Kew was able to find a couple of partnerships later in the innings to get them past the Cats score, finishing 7-150.
Ahmed, who has been a dominant force with the ball all season, was the leading wicket taker for the Cats with three wickets.
Having finished fourth, the Cats had hoped that other results had gone their way to get the second chance and progress into the semi finals.
But sixth placed Altona upset minor premiers St Bernard’s OC, meaning St Bernard’s would get the second chance.
While happy to have made finals after just missing out last season, Lambert feels like they’ve missed an opportunity.
“It wasn’t to be,” he said. “We were too reliant on one or two players and that’s why we ended up where we did.
“Last season we had the best batting attack in the competition with four or five guys making 500 and bowling was our problem.
“This season we had the best bowling team in the competition. We had the same batting line up as last year but it has not come anywhere near the same as last year.”
It wasn’t all bad news for the Cats with their third and fourth XIs winning through to grand finals.
