Sea Breeze Oval (Bailey’s Bay won toss): St George’s beat Bailey’s Bay by six wickets

St George’s gave Sinclair Smith the perfect start as captain with a convincing six-wicket victory over champions Bailey’s Bay at Sea Breeze Oval on Sunday.

The East Enders, who had a mass exodus of league players during the transfer window including former club and Cup Match captain Onias Bascome, were set a target of 162 runs at a run rate of 8.1 runs per over for victory.

They were anchored by some aggressive batting from opener Jason Anderson and Nzari Paynter, who put on a second-wicket partnership worth 122 runs to lead their team to the brink of victory.

Earlier, winning the toss and electing to bat, Bay were given a solid start by captain Terryn Fray and Coolidge Durham who put on 45 without loss in the six over powerplay. This partnership was broken in the tenth over with the score at 90 when sixth bowling change, Isiah Greaves had the latter caught for 36. Bay then lost wickets in quick succession to leave them reeling at 121 for six as young spinners Greaves and Harshad Gadge started to dominate the batsmen.

Captain Fray, who survived a first-ball lbw appeal and three bruising body blows, carried the bat and stabilised the innings with some elegant stroke play to finish unbeaten on 90 not out, including 11 fours and two sixes as Bay mustered a total of 162 for seven in their allotted 20 overs. The opening pair were the only Bay batters in double figures with 13 Extras their third highest score of their innings.

Greaves was the pick of St George’s bowlers finishing with figures of three wickets for 25 runs and was ably assisted by Gadge who claimed two wickets for 16 runs from three overs.

In reply, St George ‘s opened with veteran Jason Anderson and Macai Simmons but the latter became impatient and was caught at mid-on by Durham going for a big hit off the bowling of Kyle Hodsoll with just five runs on the board in only the second over.

Paynter then joined Anderson and the two would carry the score to 41 for one after the six over powerplay. Both batted with purpose with Paynter hitting Sharye Tavares for a straight drive for six which dented the sightscreen wall in the tenth over to hit 97 for one at the halfway stage. Not to be outdone, Anderson blasted Tavares into the long on grassy bank for a maximum to bring up the 100-run partnership in the twelfth over.

Tavares would get the last laugh as he claimed both wickets in consecutive overs. First, he had Anderson trapped lbw for a 42-ball 67 with the score 127. Anderson’s innings consisted of six fours and four sixes. Eleven runs later, Paynter became Tavares’ second wicket caught on the long off boundary by Hodsoll for 62 (five fours and four sixes). Jonte Smith and Zeko Burgess then polished the match off with two overs to spare.

Tavares was the pick of the Bay bowlers with two wickets for 31 runs from his four overs. Hodsoll and Jordan Burgess collected one wicket each for 34 and 24 runs respectively.

“Today, we started off a little rough with the bowling but we had a team talk at the half way mark and contained them in the remaining overs,” said Smith.

“It was a good partnership between Jason and Nzari. These two guys are in the nets Mondays and Wednesdays on the days that we don’t have training to put the extras in so to see it come off today, I am more then grateful as the skipper and proud as well. This was a great team effort.”