Wairarapa pass the test

The character and resolve of a largely inexperienced Wairarapa senior men's cricket side was put to the test during their five-wicket win over Wanganui in the Hawke Cup qualifying match played at Queen Elizabeth Park Oval in Masterton on Friday and Saturday.
Wairarapa had every reason to believe the match would be over by lunch on Saturday after they had dominated the first day action but thanks to a magnificent 147 by middle order batsman Tim Lance Wanganui hit back strongly and Wairarapa had to work for their victory in the end.
The vagaries of the Park Oval pitch clearly had an effect on the batting of both sides on Friday with a variable bounce seeing 20 wickets fall for just 226 runs.
Wanganui won the toss and, not surprisingly, asked Wairarapa to bat first, a decision made to look even better by some tentative Wairarapa top order batting which saw only Chad Yates (27) get amongst the runs. He was patience personified against a Wanganui attack which largely made the most of the prevailing conditions with the ball sometimes keeping low at one end and "popping" at the other and there were good signs too from Wairarapa College's Robbie Anderson, who battled through to 22.
The only real sting in the Wairarapa first innings though came from Brock Price who came in at number eight with the clear intention of taking the battle to the bowlers. He hit out lustily at anything pitched either too full or too short and his 62 played a big part in Wairarapa in making a relatively respectable 178. Medium pacer Cording had the best figures for Wanganui, taking 5-57 from his 17 overs.
The Wanganui first innings was a disaster with a five-pronged Wairarapa attack ripping them to shreds and having them all out for just 48. Hayden Spierling with 4-17 from 5.3 overs was the kingpin for Wairarapa but Seth Rance, 2-11 from 11 overs, Dean van Deventer 1-7 from five overs and Chad Yates, 3-5 from five overs, all tasted success as well.
Of the 48 runs scored by Wanganui 31 of them came from the bats of only three players with Tim Lance's 11 being top score. It was slow going too with their runs taking 30.3 overs.
Asked by Wairarapa captain Sam Curtis to follow on Wanganui again started badly with the top order crumbling before the pace of Spierling and Rance a second time but their fortunes took a complete change for the better when Tim Lance came to the wicket and, almost immediately, took charge.
Helped by a persistent habit of the Wairarapa bowlers to bowl too short and too wide and by a pitch which had become much more friendly to the batsmen, Lance displayed a wide range of shots as he raced through to his 50, his 100 and onto 147 before being caught by Curtis off the bowling off van Deventer. It was appropriate that the young Rathkeale College medium pacer should finally claim his scalp as he posed more problems to Lance than any other member of the Wairarapa attack.
Thanks to Lance, and handy contributions by tail-enders Jones (39) and Cording (29 not out), Wanganui made 297 in their second 'dig", therefore setting Wairarapa a testing 168 runs for the outright victory. Spierling had taken his second bag of four wickets, Price was a tad wayward and expensive but still had three wickets to show for his efforts and van Deventer's 2-33 from 10-3 overs was a just reward for accuracy and persistence.
For Wairarapa to take the maximum points the onus was always going to be on skipper Curtis to lead the way and he responded splendidly, batting right through their second innings to be 78 not out when the winning runs were scored. He had his odd moment of difficulty early on but once he settled in he always looked in control.
Fellow opener Daniel Stoneley, who had fallen to a brilliant catch in the first innings, showed commendable fight in reaching 18 this time, Paul Lyttle was promoted up the order and responded with a valuable 20 and Jeremy Anderson came to light with an equally valuable 29.