A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.
When the three of them fire, there’s not much you can do.
And on Saturday Rhys Grogan (76 not-out off 42 balls with two 6s and 13 boundaries), his fellow opening batsman the left-handed Jarrod Ormiston (52) and their Bollywood High School Old Boys’ Pups captain Hamish Swann (37 not-out at No.6) were superb in a 166 run-win against the DNature Dragons.
Swann won the coin-toss, chose to bat and the Pups amassed 256-5-30 overs of the nine-a-side contest on Nelson Park artificial pitch No.4. Malsha Mahabalage (15 not-out off 30 balls from No.8) was classy, but Grogan’s 42-ball innings, featuring two sixes and 13 boundaries, was one for the scrapbook.
“Rhys challenged the bowlers to vary their lines of attack,” said Swann. “It was a great start to the season for our entire team, because we all contributed — we were stoked for Muzammil (Khan) — he bowled tightly, and the vibe in the field was amazing.”
Jakeb Brown (2-10-3), Teremoana Cummings (1-21-4), Keanu Makiri (1-27-4) and Ari Robertson (1-48-5) were the Dragons’ best bowlers. The Dragons were then bowled out for 90 in 20.4 overs, courtesy of Pups seamer John Broad (3-11-3.4 overs), Swann (1-2-1), Ormiston (1-6-1), Mahabalage (1-7-1) and changes of pace from Muzammil Khan (1-20-5).
The Pups are going to need changes of pace, tight bowling and then some when they take on the Tairawhiti Women’s Cricket Club in two weeks.
Round 1 of the T30 league saw the TWCC beat the Old Boys’ Rugby Sharks by 153 runs, captain first drop Maddie Ashworth (88 not-out off 59 balls, 14 boundaries) and No.1 Grace Kuil with her unbeaten 66 from 61 at the heart of the win.
Former TWCC captain and Northern Spirit A all-rounder Kayley Knight said: “I was genuinely impressed by the girls’ performance — they played their shots and played very well.”
The Sharks bowled the eight-player TWCC out for 211 in 27 overs after Ashworth won the toss, OBR seamers Joel Kirkpatrick (1-14-4), Jack Holden (1-22-4) and Ben Langford (1-33-4) to the fore. Kuil (2-4-2), Alessandra Evans (1-6-3), Tegan Hayward (1-8-2.1 overs) and Ashworth (1-8-3) then led an in-form TWCC pace attack, as the Sharks were bowled out for 58 in 20.1 overs. Opener Dylan Worsnop and first-drop Tama Wirepa top-scored for OBR with eight runs — Wirepa facing the maximum 30 balls before retiring not-out.
The Ngatapa Knights bounced back from their 39 run T15-loss against TWCC to prevail by 72 runs against the Bollywood Stars. Knights co-captains George Gillies (30 from 34 at No.3) and Dylan Torrie (20 off 23 in 19 minutes) wielded the willow in great style — Ngatapa reaching 137-6-30 — having been put in to bat on ground No.3 by Stars captain Kelan Bryant. The game saw a brilliant turn at the bowling crease by left-arm spinner Riker Rolls: the Y7 took 3-12-5 including two maiden overs, 10 year-old teammate Marcus Gray also superb with 1-3-4, Manjot Singh (1-34-6) and Anikate Bandral (1-23-3) the other wicket-takers.
The Stars were bowled out for 65 in 16.3 overs, opener David Gray playing a fine hand (33 not-out off 32 balls), but younger brother and Ngatapa left-arm medium-pacer Jonathan Gray (2-3-2) would not be denied. He and Tom Rouse (2-6-2) received support from debutant Elenor Walsh (1-3-2), Jonah Reynolds (1-4-2), Marcus Bull (1-9-2) and Gillies (1-12-2.3 overs).
Gillies said: “We really tried to keep the energy and talking up; Elenor slotted in well with some consistent bowling. Riker was great value for Bollywood and David was solid with the bat for them, too.”