Photo above – Mohammed Saad (RHC)

Thursday 18th July

Stewart’s Melville CC 89 for 9 (17 overs); RH Corstorphine 92 for 9 (16.4 overs). Lost by 1 wicket.

The club’s bid to reach  the final of the T20 Masterton Trophy ended in last over disappointment as RHC scraped home with two balls remaining thanks to a disciplined innings of 61 not out by the Pakistani A team professional Mohammed Saad as all their other batsmen succumbed to Stew Mel’s slow bowling duo of Greg Ruthven (4 for 12) and Hayden Sweet (2 for 18) as well as some smart fielding which brought two run outs.  None of the other RHC bats scored more than five.

A twenty minute deluge of rain shortly before the planned start of 6.15pm resulted in a delayed start with the game being reduced to 17 overs a side with two bowlers being allowed four overs and others being restricted to a maximum of three.  RHC won the toss and put us into bat on the proverbial ‘tricky wicket’ which in the event favoured bowlers who took the pace off the ball.   Shaylen Pillay and Kyle McCallum opened the innings and got us off to a start of 37 runs in five overs which gave us some kind of advantage throughout most of the game.   Shaylen with a six off the second ball of the match and two fours batted with aggressive intent before being bowled last ball of the fifth over by the pacey Caleb Whitefoord who had caused us problems in the earlier league match at Barnton.   Ultimately our score of 89 was probably less than hoped for with four of our bats reaching double figures but with only two boundaries between them and all told five being bowled.  Jacob Wood bowling ‘spears’ with 4 for 14 off four overs was particularly effective and Majid Haq bowling last picked up two wickets in the last over.

With the exception of Mohammed Saad RHC’s batsmen found batting equally difficult toiling against the bowling of Shaylen in his opening two overs, Hayden Sweet and Greg Ruthven particularly while Saad rarely missed the opportunity of picking up a single as well as striking two sixes and six fours and batting with an eye on the required number.  For all that Stew Mel were ahead on DLS until the last over but the designers of that system couldn’t build in the opposition’s best bat being at the wicket for the whole innings.

Ultimately there was disappointment as Saad achieved the seven runs required to win off the last over but all in all there will be satisfaction from the whole series which saw us achieve wins against Watsonians, Grange, Accies, Edinburgh and Carlton.

View scorecard https://www.stewartsmelvillecricket.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Scorecard-SMCC-v-RHC-MT-SF-18.07.19-1.pdf