The business end of the Cricket Shepparton Haisman Shield season is fast approaching and for teams in finals contention, every game is a must win.
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Headlining round 11 action is a showdown between Numurkah and Central Park-St Brendan’s, while a contest between premiership hopefuls Mooroopna and Kyabram is also set to have finals implications.
Facing off at the Numurkah Showgrounds, Saturday afternoon’s clash between Numurkah and Central Park is a must-win for both sides.
While the Blues fell 25 runs short against the ladder-leading Katandra last week, the Tigers are also coming off a tricky run of matches.
Speaking ahead of the match, Tigers coach Tyler Larkin said he was expecting a good contest.
“Numurkah have been in good touch throughout the season and they put up a really good show last week against Katandra who are probably the best batting form team in the competition,” Larkin said.
“We’re expecting a decent game and obviously with how tight the competition is at the minute we dropped two games and now we’re fifth so it’s really tight at the top and every game counts.
“It’s looking like we’ve got pretty much a full team at the minute so it’s just about performing on the weekend, which we’ve struggled to do the past month.”
Like Larkin, Numurkah captain Dylan Grandell expects a good battle.
“Obviously they are sitting near us on the table so it goes a long way to getting a home final in the top three if we can win this week, so we’re looking forward to it and it should be a good challenge,” Grandell said.
Going in with an unchanged squad, the Blues are cautious of their opponents’ strengths but will be aiming to perform well on a good-looking home deck.
“They’ve got some dangerous cricketers so we’ll have to be at the top of our game and work on making sure we’re ready to go for the entire game,” Grandell said.
“It’s no more important than any other game, obviously when you’re playing top sides you want to bring your best performance so we’re looking forward to it.”
With Numurkah sitting on 45 points and Central Park-St Brendan’s on 43, a positive result on Saturday is a must.
The battle for victory is even more important when considering Mooroopna (second, 51 points) and Kyabram (third, 46 points) are doing battle at Mooroopna Recreation Reserve.
Making the trip to the Cattery off the back of an impressive victory over Waaia, the Redbacks are likely to prove a difficult opponent for the home side.
Speaking ahead of the contest, Kyabram coach Jackson McLay said the side would have to play better than it had in recent weeks to pick up the win.
“They have obviously been the benchmark for the past two years,” McLay said.
“So it is obviously going to be a big test, but we are in a good spot at the moment to go in and test ourselves against the benchmark.
“In saying that though we haven’t quite put the complete game together, which isn’t a bad thing considering we are still sitting in third spot and haven’t played our best yet."
Boasting the talented Kyle Mueller in its lineup, McLay explained the side did not want to have to rely on the local star.
“We are a lot happier having him with us than having to bowl to him, but we also don’t want to be a one-man-band,” he said.
“It was nice to have Billy (McLay) go along with him last week and make a score, so if we can build partnerships and not just leave it up to Kyle it will go a long way to winning the game.
“I think this match will come down to which side bats better on the day.”
Highlighting the fact that the contest was a rematch of last season’s Haisman Shield decider, Mooroopna coach Luke Zanchetta said it was set to be a big test.
“Kyabram are going really good at the moment, they’ve lost one game like ourselves,” Zanchetta said.
“Last week we had a late out with Jack Gaskill and he’ll likely come back in.
“Obviously that means there will be an unlucky person, nobody deserved to lose their spot — everyone’s been performing.”
Elsewhere on Saturday, Karramomus will place host to the ladder-leading Katandra at Vibert Reserve and Shepparton United is set to travel to Tallygaroopna to take on Northerners.
At Kialla Park Reserve Waaia will be aiming to rejoin the winners’ list against Old Students, while Tatura and Nagambie will meet at the Frank Howley Oval.
What the other clubs had to say
Steve Allen, Northerners coach (Northerners v Shepparton United)
“We are still in the mix as far as the top six goes, and I think last week (a win over Karramomus) was an improvement on our cricket, but there was certainly things we could improve on.
“We’re still trying to find the right mix with our XI, so the main focus for us this week is what we can control and we won’t be overanalysing the situation with the ladder and so forth.
“We know Shepparton United will be a good challenge for us, they have played some good cricket this season, so we are under no allusions that we’ll need to be at our best on Saturday.”
Chaminda Vidanapathirana, Shepparton United playing coach (Northerners v Shepparton United)
“We have four more games and we are desperate for a win, we have just got to win because we are doing lots of things right but aren’t quite getting that reward at the moment.
“Batting has probably been our weak link this season, so we just need one of our top four to bat deep and make a big score for us, if we do that I am confident we have the bowling that can win games for us.
“A win this weekend would give our confidence a massive boost.”
Mitch Cleeland, Waaia captain (Old Students vs Waaia)
“It’s getting to that pointy end of the season where every game becomes important, not that the games before haven’t been.
"We know we need to win at least three, at worst-case scenario, if not all four.
“Every game is very important and the Students have been going quite well, they’ve been a bit of a nemesis for us over the past few years, we seem to have a hiccup against them so I’m expecting another good contest.”
Ben Clurey, Katandra playing coach (Karramomus v Katandra)
“We’re shaping up pretty good, we’ve had a couple of challenging games the past couple of weeks up against some of the better sides.
“We’re all up and about, pretty happy and ready to roll into the next couple of weeks, we’ve got Kyabram coming up which will be a tough game again and then the bye the following week where you get zero points so we’ll be super keen to try and get a couple more wins in before March rolls around.
“We’re looking to keep that positive feeling coming and hopefully the wins keep coming too.”
Daniel Coombs, Tatura playing coach (Tatura v Nagambie)
“It was a pretty hard game to watch last week. It was a case of ‘catches win matches’ for us again, we dropped two chances and then they both went on to hurt us.
“I was disappointed with our bowling; I thought we bowled too many loose balls and boundary balls and we just didn’t put pressure on the batters.
“Nagambie always bowl well and have a good balance of seam and spin but they have struggled with the bat and so we’ll try to put pressure on them. We welcome back our wicket-keeper Xavier Hutchison and he’ll add to our batting depth.”
Mark Nolan, Nagambie captain (Tatura v Nagambie)
“(Last week) was a good performance by the boys and it definitely gives us a lot of momentum and confidence going into this weekend.
“We hadn’t won for a while so it should give the group some confidence.
“The squad will be the same as last week which is the first time that’s happened all season.
“We might have to win all of our remaining games, every one of them is like a finals game for us. We put ourselves in this position but we know that if we give our best it’s good enough to walk away with a win.”
Daniel is a passionate sports fan and proud Tasmanian.