THE EXPERIENCED players had it over the youngsters in both the Porter Hire Premier 1 games on Saturday.
An understrength St Johns Tech, other than their Central District's women's representative, did not have much of a dig in their batting collapse to Property Brokers United, losing by eight wickets on the artificial pitch at Springvale.
Meanwhile, Bayer Marist have all but retained their Premier title as they got to play on an honest wicket, flat track though it was, with their 97-run win over Collegiate on the school's No1 pitch.
Missing veteran Bevan Hunter (injured toe) and Tyler Lock (golf tournament), Tech lost Caleb Greene early when United's Ryan Slight trapped him in front.
After the departure of aggressive pacemen Andrew Cording and Jamie Whiteman in successive seasons, United's attack is not as imposing as previously, but Hayden Kirk showed getting the ball on line is all you need as he sunk Tech's hopes by clean bowling their out-of-sorts captain Dominic Lock for only four.
The other opener Andrew Mackintosh tried to shore up an end but did not look comfortable, as surprisingly all the aggression was shown by Premier 1's female player Jessica Watkin (29).
Having her eye in after a couple of decent knocks for the Central District Hines team during the week, including a 39, Watkin was not afraid to take on the likes of spinner Tom Lance, hitting him down the ground where the ball stopped short of the long boundary, although from the other end she did find the fence three times.
Nonetheless, Lance would get her with Slight taking the catch, and other than a cameo from Jordan Baldwin down the order, who swatted two sixes, the lower order would fall to Lance (3-45) and the cool accuracy of regular Premier 2 captain Ritesh Verma, the game's MVP.
"I just bowled alright, I hit the stumps four times," said Verma, who finished with 5-24 from his nine overs.
In reply, Tech's Trent Hemi fired in a few short-pitched deliveries to let United know he was still there, picking up veteran Gerard Hobbs cheaply.
Yet United captain Max Carroll (32) and Robbie Power (35) picked off the remaining 60-odd runs in short order to get their team off the mark in the Premier competition, although they still have a game in hand to play Collegiate.
The school side finally made their late entry into the competition on Saturday, having played Christ's College the weekend before, while Marist welcomed back their age-grade cricket and rugby representative Brett Cameron for a game, although the teenager is spending most of the summer focusing on his development for the winter code.
While they had a few concerns losing two quick wickets in the 90's, all of the Marist batsmen got starts and played watchfully, settling at 114-4 in the 31st over, with opener John McIlraith (35), and the partnership between captain Mark Fraser (30) and Ross Kinnerley (36) having the best digs.
Marist could even be encouraged that the Collegiate bowler who gave them the most trouble was Todd Inness (3-48), who will be joining them in January after completing his last year at school.
In reply, Collegiate's youngsters could not find their line as Sam O'Leary and the Kinnerley's - Fraser and Ross - got amongst them to have the writing on the wall at 68-6.
If there was any encouragement, it was lower order batsman Matt Simes (23) showing what was possible with a little patience, stroking the ball into gaps and running hard, before Jonathan Steward rattled his stumps.
Ross Kinnerley came back on and finished with another good haul as the last two Collegiate batsmen had little idea what to do with his line and lost their stumps as a result.
With three straight wins, Marist have their last Premier game with Tech next weekend and a bye in the final round, with Fraser confident four points will keep them safe.
He hoped the Tasman Tanning pitches at Victoria Park will be ready to go.
"It's definitely better to play on grass, even if the [Collegiate] wicket wasn't what we hoped to be.
"Every single batsman struggled so we did well to get to 190."
Casting his eyes ahead to Active Physio Wanganui's first Hawke Cup match against Hawke's Bay in Napier on November 15-16, Fraser was happy the representative bowlers were getting overs under their belts at club level.