PNBHS 1st XI Cricket VS Napier Boys’ High School 1st XI – Challenge Shield Defence – 50 over game
Winning the toss Napier chose to bat on the artificial wicket. Good tight bowling and fielding combined with an outfield that did not return value for shots played allowed the first XI to dominate Napier. 1/0, became 5/62, became 9/83. Their tail wagged though and a small but effective partnership took them through to being all out for 107. Tom Collier (on debut) 2/18, Matt Rowe 2/22, and Fred McVerry 2/28 led the bowling attack.
At the halfway stage it would be fair to say PNBHS were the happiest of the 2 sides, but this is cricket and anything can happen. In fact anything did happen as we embarked into 46 overs of woefulness. To say the batting effort was disappointing is an understatement. Too many batsmen made poor decisions, getting themselves out and backing us into a corner. At 6/53 we were up against it. Plenty of time, but placing a lot of pressure on the lower order. A positive partnership of 51 between Jett Donald-Charnley (30) and Jacob Duker (22) almost saw us home until Jett gently chipped a shot to long on. 4 runs required with 3 wickets in hand, no worries. A single and 2 wides later we lost our final wicket. Scores were tied.
Link to all photos from the game: https://drive.google.com/.../1ZwiwO1qaSV4NHA1hJWYWRQsfx7r...
