CRICKET - Discrepancy turns tables Kamo's way

Onerahi-Central and Kamo emerged as the early leaders in the Northland Cricket Association's inaugural premier grade Twenty20 competition but for Kamo there was more than a bit of luck involved.
In fact Kamo's first win on Saturday was something of a Lazarus story. Their opponents City, were celebrating a great win after restricting the Kamo batsmen to just a single off the final ball of the innings - giving them a win - or so they thought.
As they trooped off the pitch congratulating themselves, a score book discrepancy between the two books came to light, Kamo veteran Murray Coop said. "One scorebook said 109 runs while the other said 110, the books clearly didn't tally and then it was, so what now?"
After deciding the two teams were tied after all, a "bowl-off" had to be used to find a winner. Kamo just came out ahead in the tie-breaker, eventually winning 4-3. "A lot of people were having trouble hitting the stumps and in the end Jeet Malhi nailed it," Coop said. "It sure seems a lot easier when there's a batsman standing in front of the wickets for some reason, but we got there in the end. It was quite a turnaround," he added.
Kamo then took on another of last year's top sides, Maungakaramea, in their second match and won by another close margin - that time two runs.
"It was a good start to the season all right. It looks as though we could have the right balance this summer," Coop said.
With a young bowling attack beginning to hit their straps, scoring runs was always going to be the problem for Kamo this season but the addition of Zimbabwean professional Terry Duffin to their playing roster may have solved that dilemma.
Duffin carried his bat in the first match with an unbeaten 64, while he top-scored with a half-century in the second match against Maungakaramea.
Onerahi had an relatively easy win over Rodney, in the competition to cover for Whangarei Boys High School, who are on tour in Australia. The Rodney club were relatively inexperienced at this level and Onerahi beat them comfortably in the first match with captain Harry Darkins among the runs, scoring 50 before retiring, and Ross Kneebone taking six wickets.
Their second win of the day was against much tougher opposition in the form of Kaipara Flats, but once again solid batting saw them through to victory, this time by eight wickets.
City had to be satisfied with two points from the day with one victory over Rodney, while Kaipara also had a single win over Maungakaramea.
New Northland Cricket operations manager Graham Barlow said it was good for him to have all the games played at the same venue.
"I know it was a bit cramped and it was on artificial wickets but at least I was able to get a look at a few of the players I haven't seen yet so from my point of view aspect it was really good."
"Also, after spending two or three months getting these competitions in place it was nice to see them run off all right," he said.
The competition now moves to Kaipara next weekend when two round-robin matches will be played on Saturday and another on Sunday, with the final between the two teams leading on points the finale on the final day.