St Andrew’s College First XI fell by 95 runs to Grey High School from Port Elizabeth in Grahamstown on Saturday. The warm and sunny conditions at the St Andrew’s field would promote some entertaining cricket.
The hosts, without a win in their last six encounters, opted to bowl first on the scorcher of a day, and looked to have their opponents in trouble after 41 overs, with Grey recording a paltry 124-3. Leading the charge for the boys from Port Elizabeth were Tristan Du Randt (48 off 95 balls) and Luke Beaufort (49 off 97), who produced fine knocks with the willow. Nicholas Frances was St Andrew’s destroyer-in-chief, with the youngster ending with superb bowling figures of 5-84 from his 24 overs.
The away side managed just 22 runs over their final four wickets, but their 201 was a competitive-enough total and would ensure that St Andrew’s dig deep to secure victory in the late afternoon heat. Indeed, despite Callum Francis’ gutsy innings of 42 off 73, it wasn’t enough to see St Andrew’s over the line and, notwithstanding help from opener James Mullins (17 off 33) and Ryan Ford (26 off 43), found themselves all-out for a meagre 106 in just 37 overs. For the visitors, Tiaan van Vuuren (3-11 in his 7 overs) and Eliah Thorne (3-8 in 7) produced match-winning figures.
St Andrew’s coach Carl Bradfield, reflected on his side’s disappointing performance. “Grey had a convincing win. We bowled well but Grey’s left-arm fast bowler Tian van Vuuren got amongst us early on. We struggled to recover [from that spell]and were eventually bowled out at 17h30.”
The loss was the Grahamstonians’ 5th of the season in what was their 20th match in 2018. Despite the result, they remain the 16th-ranked school in the country.
