Rain comes to Greenock's rescue
Greenock 1st XI vs Ferguslie
WDCU CSL First Division
Saturday 19th July 2014
| Ferguslie | 244 for 6 | K Dabengwa 93, MM English 61, M Kruger 59*; GJ McDougall 4 for 64 |
| Greenock 1st XI |
The 1st XI match at Glenpark on Saturday afternoon almost made it through to the end of the Ferguslie innings before the umpires and players gave in to the increasingly wet conditions.
Greenock won the toss and inserted Ferguslie, and with just the sixth ball of the match, pace bowler Tom Batters gave the Glenparkers the best possible start when Gregor Preston-Jones edged the ball and was well held by 1st XI captain Shailesh Prabhu standing in as wicketkeeper for the afternoon.
The delight at this early wicket was short-lived as Zimbabwean professional Keith Dabengwa and Scotland U19 international Michael English then put on a stand of 140 runs before English was caught by Dwight Thomas off the bowling of Guy Crichton, having scored a very fine 61.
Greenock’s opening bowlers Tom Batters and Jonathan Hempsey had done well in the opening ten overs restricting Ferguslie’s two danger men, Dabengwa and English to just 24 runs, however in the persistent, light rain conditions, the ball became increasingly difficult for bowlers and fielders and the two class batsmen gradually gained the initiative.
Dabengwa was joined by 19 year old Namibian amateur Malan Kruger when English departed and the two batsmen from the southern part of Africa continued to push the visitors score along at just above six runs an over. Dabengwa (93) was out just seven runs short of his century when Greg McDougall had him caught by Prabhu behind the stumps with the score on 205 in the 36th over.
McDougall then captured a further three wickets in fairly quick order as firstly Stafford (2) was bowled, then Warden was LBW first ball and thirdly Carruthers (3) was bowled having faced just six balls.
When the rain became torrential in the 42nd over, the umpires took the players off the field with Ferguslie on 244 for the loss of six wickets. Kruger was unbeaten on 59. Greg McDougall took 4 wickets for 64 runs.
A short time afterwards with the heavy rain having flooded various parts of the ground, and with the forecast indicating a long period of torrential rain, a decision was taken to abandon the match.
