Hoppers Crossing coach Greg Kennedy said his side would not let a thumping nine-wicket T20 loss at the weekend alter their focus for the season ahead.
Hoppers were comprehensively outplayed by Ivanhoe in Saturday’s T20 fixture, bowled out for just 81 and then taking just one wicket in the second innings as Ivanhoe cruised home with five overs to spare.
Kennedy said it was no secret that T20 was not his side’s preferred format.
“Obviously not the ideal result,” he said.
“However afterwards we reflected that it is just one T20 match out of a season of 13 matches, so it isn’t the end of the world.
“We shot ourselves in the foot and made some errors with both bat and ball, but we’re not taking it too hard given we are straight back into three two-day matches. So the T20 is gone and we’re back into real cricket.”
Batting first on a slow deck, Hoppers lost regular wickets throughout their innings as they slumped to 7-55, courtesy of some tight bowling and good fielding.
The home side panicked at times, contributing to four run-outs across the innings. Brandon Diplock (11), Justin Goegan (10) and Brett Smith 17) were the only players to register double figure scores.
In reply, Kennedy dropped what would have been a highlight reel worthy catch on the first ball of Ivanhoe’s innings, and from there things never went the home side’s way.
Abbas Faiyaz grabbed the solitary wicket for Hoppers, who will now turn their focus towards six weeks of long form cricket.
“Our focus has always been on red ball cricket and that’s what we think we play our best at, so if we play well through the red ball season we can still play finals,” Kennedy said.
“We’ll be back on the maiden train with the ball, which is our strength, and last week when guys were given the chance to occupy the crease and build an innings we were able to make over 300.
“So on both sides of the game we’re really looking forward to getting back to the red ball.”
Hoppers Crossing will travel to take on Altona this Saturday.
In other games at the weekend, Werribee fell to an 18-run defeat at the hands of Williamstown, despite the best efforts of its top order.
Williamstown was able to get regular contributions throughout its batting as it posted 142, with Michael Kelly (2/33) and Jack Budd (2/26) the pick of the bowlers.
In reply, Werribee’s top three all got starts but none could go on to get the big score that the side needed to challenge.
The middle order was left with too much ground to make up as the home side finished its 20 overs on 6-124.
