At the end of last season, the culture among the Guyra Cricket Club players was touted as one of the leading factors in their superb form towards the back end of the competition. That culture has carried on into this season with the first grade team enjoying a first innings-win against grand finalists Hillgrove for round two.
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After day one saw them claim first innings, Guyra just continued their form into day two. Skipper Matt Jackson stood tall with 74 not out in a late partnership with returner to the Guyra team in Charlie White.
“When I moved back to Guyra I was looking forward to going back and playing with a few old mates and Charlie White was one of those,” Jackson said.
“I ran one of my players out as soon as I got to the wicket and Charlie came to the crease.
“We hadn't had a bat together for six or seven years and it was fun. It is always good when you can play with someone where you both have a go at each other if you do something silly and it is not extremely serious but serious enough.”
We had the capability to bat all day and not really give them a chance
- Matt Jackson
Sixty-four of number four batsman Shane Wolfenden’s 77 runs came from boundaries with 13 fours and two sixes in his innings.
“He seemed to take a liking to Matt Schaefer and everyone else,” Jackson said.
“In the first couple of innings he went out and we probably put a bit too much pressure on him to try and see the new ball off, being an opener. In this game we told him to go out there and enjoy himself.”
Jackson declared at 8-296 and Hillgrove ran out of time to chase down the required total.
“We had the capability to bat all day and not really give them a chance,” he said.
“We thought we would leave them 25 overs to bat out at the end of the day which would have left them to get 20 runs an over, which is a pretty phenomenal task.
“If they did that then they deserved to win but if we were able to sneak a few wickets we might have been able to put a bit of a scare down the order.”
While a few of their batsmen higher in the order were dismissed for low total, Jackson isn’t worried.
He said there is plenty of time to work on their form and hopes they will fire at the back-end of the season.
“They will find form as the season goes on. We are not all going to have all the form at the same time. When it is like it was on the weekend there was no pressure on those blokes at the time but there will come a time when it is their turn to get runs and I hope they are ready,” Jackson said.