Early scalp: Rochester opener Blake Evans is bowled by Matt Hinks. Photo: Bruce Povey.
Photo by
Bruce Povey
Rochester’s red-hot start to the Goulburn Murray Cricket A-grade competition was halted by a hard-earned 153-run partnership between Echuca’s Matt Hinks and Taylor Beard.
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Echuca rolled Rochester by 110 runs, a team that had been in red-hot form in the opening two games of the season before the batting line-up fizzled on Saturday.
Winning the toss and batting first on its home pitch, Echuca got off the mark immediately, with Curtis Townrow smashing 38 runs from 27 deliveries.
Dylan Cuttriss and Daniel Major partnered to get Rochester’s first breakthrough, with Townrow caught behind off the former’s delivery.
With Echuca sitting 1-48, the side soon lost their next three wickets for 23 runs before Hinks and Beard rose to the task.
Balance: Rochester’s Jesse Cuttriss makes a pull shot on his way to 18. Photo: Bruce Povey.
Photo by
Bruce Povey
Hinks put together a mature innings at number three, scoring 71 runs, while Beard provided extra firepower as the sixth batter to get a quick 88 runs off 79 balls, including 13 boundaries.
Beard and Hinks were eventually dismissed within a run of each other, as Adam Jones (two runs) and Chris Hinks (five) batted out the remaining balls to get Echuca to 6-232.
Switching to the field, a collective effort from Rylea Jones (3-20), Chris Hinks (2-17) and Beard (2-8) saw Rochester’s usual stars fall quite easily.
The early breakthrough of opening batter Blake Evans (for 1-4) was later followed by the dismissal of in-form Rochester captain Sean Williams for a mere 17 runs.
“We felt five or six of Rochester’s really good batsmen are all quite attacking batters,” Echuca skipper Beard said.
“So if we could tie them down, and build a bit of pressure, we thought we could get them out, which it kind of did work that way.”
Opening batter Major topped the scoring for Rochester, though Echuca eventually unravelled the Tigers’ line-up for 9-122 in 35 overs.
Goulburn Murray Cricket’s A-grade teams will switch from the one-day contests of the past three weeks to a two-day contest from Saturday, with Rochester set to host Leitchville-Gunbower at Moon Oval.
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