Gallery | Mooroopna and Nagambie qualify for Goulburn Murray Women’s cricket final following emphatic semi victories

In the end, though, only one of those two has repeated the dose in search of the 2024-25 flag with the reigning premiers from the border dumped out.

The Cats, unbeaten in regular season play for the second straight season after entering in the 2023-24 campaign, were naturally favoured on home soil coming up against local rivals Shepparton Youth Club United.

Given Mooroopna had chased down totals in the 50s for consecutive rounds, it was no surprise that the visitors would be sent in to bat.

The home attack had it anything but on its own terms early on though, as Sophie Ullah and Lia Beecroft presented a resolute united front in each retiring not-out while Mel Saunders was three balls off doing the same after coming in at three.

The main positive for Mooroopna was that such a dangerous top three had been held to 59 runs, and Bella Woods was able to earn that reward for toil down the order as the scoreboard slowed to a crawl, 74 becoming the target for another grand final berth.

Ebony Sleeth, in and out of the opening spot throughout the season, made her contributions count after walking out alongside Lauren Hall.

Her 33, at better than a run a ball, featured four boundaries and made the contest appear a matter of time before the Cats’ fate would be confirmed.

All told, Mooroopna was able to put the front foot firmly down in booking back-to-back tickets for the big dance, overpowering the Princess Park outfit by nine wickets on a day where only four poles were claimed overall.

Coach Jeff Vandermeer was understandably glowing in his post-match assessment.

“It’s good reward for the girls who put in the effort,” Vandermeer said.

“We put some in as coaches too, but they’re a very committed side and they look forward to the cricket each week.

“United’s top players like Sophie and Lia, they have players who can score but, to our girls’ credit, they kept it reasonably on track.

“We might have dropped a couple of catches and maybe a couple of run-out chances we missed, which was a bit unlike us, but that’s all something to work on.

“Hopefully there’s more that we can do next week. Every team that makes it works hard to get there, but not everybody gets that reward.”

While some coaches might consider it a fortunate problem to have, there is the complex situation of few batters hitting a regular rhythm at the crease given the repeat low totals Mooroopna has had to chase down.

It encourages steadfast and watchful batting though, and it’s a necessary skill at the pointy end of the campaign.

“You’re not putting totals down where you have to chase 120, so you just have to go at it sensibly and wait for bad balls,” Vandermeer said.

“Not a lot of them have had a good hit the last few weeks, but we’ll work with them at training because in a grand final, they might be needed.”

Indeed, a surely troublesome outfit in Nagambie will meet the Cats in Sunday’s decider at Cooma in a clash of two Cricket Shepparton outfits each in their second season within this league.

Kayla Shepherd and Kait Carracher went on their merry ways together, as we have come to see so often from that duo, as the Lakers set the green machine an imposing target of 131.

The aforementioned pair would prove equally potent with the ball, claiming two victims apiece alongside Breanna Davison as Echuca lost its final six wickets for only 16, falling 55 runs short of keeping title defence hopes alive.

Grand final action at Cooma kicks off from 11am this Sunday, March 2.