Northland missed out of making the top four on a run rate count back after three teams: Northland, Counties-Manukau and Waikato Valley were all level on points after their division's round robin games.
"It can be hit and miss trying to get in the top half of the table ... but it goes both ways, two years ago we only won one T20 game and we made it into the top four," Parlane said.
Northland lost their first game against Waikato Valley but then bounced back to beat Counties-Manukau in a T20 game and a ND Invitational side in a one-day match. The fourth match against Poverty Bay was washed out on Wednesday.
The final match was a two-day game against Bay of Plenty Coastlands - for fifth place.
"It was a fantastic game of cricket which either team could have won but we didn't quite have the mental toughness we needed to tough it out on the last day," Parlane said.
The Tauranga-based side declared at 301/8 and Northland looked good at 100/1 until a middle order collapse saw them fall to 170/7 and robbed them of the chance of a win. The Northland lower order, particularly Josh Crawford, Shane Burton and Jarod Ross all fought hard for the last three wickets but Northland were dismissed for 267.
Chamodh Peiris (57) and Noel Roberts (33) batted well at the top of the order before throwing their wickets away, while Matthew Lobb fought hard for his 32 before being undone by a "pretty good nut" by Tauranga bowler Harrison Perry.
"I was proud of the way they played they could have easily shut up shop in tough conditions on Thursday but they fought back really hard, so in the end I was really proud of them," Parlane said.
The team did have an encouraging T20 win over Counties-Manukau " the eventual winners of the competition. The bowling highlights for the tournament came during that win.
Fletcher Coutts took a hat-trick to finish off the Counties' innings. Sean Beamish got the first three wickets and Findlay Buchanan took the middle four. .
There were other positives from the tournament, including the side's attitude and work rate in the field was one of them.
"It was the third tournament down there for me and it was far and away the best bowling and fielding performance over the tournament by any team as far as I am concerned " and by the team that was perhaps least likely to do well of those three teams," he said.
He said a "grumpy" team talk after their first T20 loss against Waikato Valley had produced the right effect.
"After that they played as a team and played for the kauri and that's just the attitude we want to bring back to Northland cricket," Parlane said.
Counties were crowned champions after fast bowler Scott Johnston took 5-24 and helped bundle Hamilton out for 158 in the 46th over of the final. In the chase Counties Manukau lost regular wickets and at 118/7. Johnson completed his man of the match performance with 27 runs at number-nine to see Counties home in the 47th over.
The Northland team was: Findlay Buchanan, Chamodh Peiris, Noel Roberts, Matthew Lobb, Lewis Miller, Fletcher Coutts, Liam Jones Josh Crawford, Shane Burton, Jarod Ross, Sean Beamish, Max Trimble.
