10 months ago
50
EXCELSIOR High School lifted their third title of the 2024 ISSA schoolboy cricket season yesterday, defeating rural area champions Manchester by 185 runs in the ISSA All-Island Spaulding Cup at the Melbourne Cricket Oval.
The Mountain View Avenue school first won the ISSA GK Insurance under-19 competition before stealing a march on St George’s College to claim the T20 competition before yesterday’s demolition job.
Excelsior had scored 218 all-out in the first innings before bowling out Manchester for 71.
With a healthy lead already in their favour, they raced to 255 all out yesterday before again dismissing Manchester for 217.
Resuming day two on 82 for 4, Excelsior were bowled out shortly after lunch with captain Michael Clarke leading the charge with 57. Tarreque Forbes chipped in with 39.
Manchester’s Brian Barnes was the pick of the bowlers with four for 56, while Barrington Simpson ended with figures of three for 48.
Set 403 for victory, Manchester’s top order was blown away to leave them reeling at 55-4.
A fifth-wicket partnership between Pajay Nelson and Rhevon Morgan, worth 100, provided stern resistance, but after Nelson was caught off the bowling of Clarke, hope seemed to have drowned.
The Manchester innings would eventually end 15 minutes before the day’s play should have come to a close.
Clarke ended with figures of 4-72 while Demarco Scott bagged 4 for 50 to lead the bowling charge.
Kirkland Bailey, head coach of Excelsior, said he was sure the target would have proven difficult for Manchester.
“When we wrapped them up for 71 in their first innings, we really set the cats amongst the pigeons. We knew that if we batted for a session and a half, we would have gotten a total that would have been insurmountable, and asking them to get a score over 400 on a surface that was proving tricky, we knew we would have won at the end of the day,” said Bailey.
Barry Barnes, head coach of Manchester, explained that with his top order misfiring, the total proved daunting.
“We knew the task would have been very hard, but we were not going to lie down and play dead. I think we tried, but when you have your three main batters not scoring any meaningful runs, we knew it was going to be a hard task. Congratulations to Excelsior. I think they were the better team, but I’m also proud of my boys,” said Barnes.
Excelsior will now turn their attention to the ISSA/TVJ Super 8 T20 competition, a symbol of all-island schoolboy dominance in the shortened version of the game.
English (US) ·