Red Star graft wins cup first blood

Red Star recorded their first win in the Wairarapa Cricket Association's Bidwell Cup competition this season when they upset Greytown by a resounding 56 runs in their one innings match played at Queen Elizabeth Park oval in Masterton on Saturday.
Greytown, who were missing some of their key players including Central Stag Seth Rance, Mark Childs and Blake Lyford, won the toss and skipper Paul Lyttle decided to bowl. He also elected to open with young spinner Nash Patel and he couldn't have responded better to the challenge, returning the remarkable figures of 3-7 off his 15 overs.
Patel's control of flight and length along with his variation of pace was hugely impressive and despite his youth he must be pressing hard for representative selection.
The Red Star innings of 189 was built around two partnerships. The first between Robbie Anderson (34) and Chris Wenden saw runs come at a slow rate but, importantly, was long enough to ensure their team had wickets at hand for the charge later in the innings. It was then that Nikolai Karaitiana (42) and Jared Watt (30) showed their hand with Watt riding his luck with some aggressive stroke making and Karaitaina often piercing the field with drives and cuts.
Patel was obviously the star turn in more ways than one with the ball for Greytown but their more experienced spinner Steve Coleman also did a good job in taking 5-54 from his 15 overs. He was nowhere near as economical as Patel but was always prepared to give the ball plenty of air in the hope of tempting the batsmen into playing a false shot.
Greytown started their innings badly by losing two early wickets but Tim Lucas (32) and Steve Coleman (44) fought back and while they were at the wicket hopes of victory for the southerners were high.
However, it was a very different story once they were gone with Red Star continuing to pick up wickets at regular intervals and going into the last over they needed one more scalp to secure the maximum points.
Skipper Shay O'Gorman, who had already claimed two wickets with his spin, returned and claimed the final scalp to seal victory.
Not surprisingly, O'Gorman was delighted Red Star had ended their winless drought with the batting effort being a sharp improvement on what had gone on before. "It has been extremely difficult over the last few weeks with our results but the guys have dug deep and produced a good result," he said.
Greytown skipper Lyttle was making no excuses for his team's defeat. "I'm very disappointed with how we played but you'd have to say Red Star was the better team on the day," he said.
Rathkeale College and Wairarapa College played out a draw in their Bidwell Cup fixture with Rathkeale taking the most points through scoring more runs in their 60 overs.
Batting first, Rathkeale got through to 190, thanks in the main to a well-compiled 63 by opener George Falloon and 44 from Harry Clinton-Baker. Wairarapa College took a largely conservative approach in their batting effort and never really looked likely to pass the Rathkeale total. They ended up at 161-8 although Rathkeale were left with only one wicket to snare in the last two overs when Wairarapa College coach H.Wiramanaden retired hurt with his score on 35.