So it proved. Poverty Bay made a safe start in their run chase but they weren’t able to go up a gear, captain Andrew Gibbs said.
“We were probably a little bit outclassed,” he said.
“We were schooled on some of the basic skills of cricket.”
Poverty Bay crawled to 73 all out in 31.2 overs.
They were without their South African contingent — injured duo Nic Hendrie and Graham Hudson, and Bruce Kerr, who was away for exams — and missed their input.
On the batting side, Gibbs said a mindset adjustment was required. Rather than waiting for bad balls to put away, the batsmen needed to work out ways to rotate the strike.
Hamilton were scoring at 6.9 runs an over in their last 20 overs.
Gibbs set attacking fields and made one or two bold calls in the use of his bowlers. It nearly paid off, though.
Leg-spinner Parminder Kulaar (2-65 off 10 overs) created chances and Josiah Turner (3-43 off five) was rewarded with wickets when he bowled full.
Gibbs said Hamilton produced a counter-attack and put the pressure back on the bowlers.
“They did get away on us.”
No.4 Paddy Carsons managed the tempo expertly, scoring 85 off 93 balls.
The bowlers extracted some movement in the first 10 overs but the pitch flattened out and Gibbs felt, on such a true surface, 280 was about par.
But the target ballooned out to more than it should have.
As a unit, Poverty Bay looked underdone. Their bowling was mixed and they struggled in the field. Their batting scorecard probably speaks for itself. The last nine batsmen contributed 20 runs between them.
The margin of victory may suggest a thrashing from start to finish but Poverty Bay were well in the game for the first 30 overs.
They had Hamilton 136-5 after 28 overs and the damage for the visitors might have been worse if the locals had held their catches.
Hamilton captain Elliot Santner, brother of Black Cap Mitchell Santner, said his side might have been restricted to under 200.
However, Carsons and No.7 Matt Whitley (46) put on a partnership of 110 for the sixth wicket and Santner said it basically won them the game.
Whitley fell to a fabulous catch by Scott Tallott, the wicketkeeper diving away to his left and pouching the ball just above the turf after Jimmy Holden found the batsman’s inside edge, but by that stage Hamilton had amassed an imposing total.
Carsons’s well-paced knock came to an end in the 48th over and Whitley’s in the 49th.
Paul Stewart bowled tightly for the Bay when the pressure was on, going for five runs an over off six, and Alex Gooding conceded nine runs from six overs.
Hamilton’s spinners took seven wickets between them — off-spinner Jack Devane taking 4-27 off 10 overs and leg-spinner Santner 3-7 off 3.2 overs.
Santner said that was set up by the seamers, who kept a tight rein on the runs.
The spinners enjoyed operating with the long boundaries at Harry Barker Reserve.
And Santner said the ball came on to the bat nicely.
“We love playing here; it’s such a nice ground,” he said.
One bright moment for the hosts was when Marshall Norris bowled classy No.3 Sajith Dhambagolla, who has scored two unbeaten centuries in club cricket this season and a 99.
Dhambagolla made 29 against Poverty Bay.
Kulaar opened the batting for the Bay and top-scored for the home team with 26.
Fellow opener David Situ hung in until the 24th over for his 16.
Poverty Bay umpire Jason Trowill made his debut at representative level in the fixture.
Poverty Bay’s next Basil McBurney Trophy game is against Bay of Plenty’s second 11 at Mount Maunganui on December 1.
Hamilton second 11 283-8 off 50 overs (Paddy Carsons 85, Matt Whitley 46, James Field 32, Sajith Dhambagolla 29; Josiah Turner 3-43, Parminder Kulaar 2-65) beat Poverty Bay 73 off 31.2 overs (Kulaar 26; Jack Devane 4-27, Elliot Santner 3-7).
