http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Auckland-c766 wins tight encounter against Wellington
Auckland defeated Wellington in a nail-biting finish in the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754 Cricket One-Day Competition played at Auckland. Auckland won the high-scoring match by just eight runs.
Wellington won the toss and elected to bowl first on a track that didn’t seem to have too much assistance for the bowlers. http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Jeet-Raval-c1685 and Lou Vincent started the innings with confidence and scored some good boundaries in the initial overs.
Vincent was the first wicket to fall after he got 17 runs. Raval also failed to capitalise on the start he got, and was dismissed after scoring 37 runs. The total at that stage was 78 for the loss of two wickets. The captain and wicketkeeper of the home
team, Gareth Hopkins then joined http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Anaru-Kitchen-c1032 at the crease. The pair gave a wonderful century stand to the team and took the score to 184 in 32 overs. Hopkins attacked the bowlers whereas Kitchen played steadily to assist his captain. Kitchen was out after
scoring a well constructed innings of 52 runs. A couple of quick wickets fell after the departure of Kitchen but Hopkins continued his dominance.
Kyle Mills supported his captain and took the score to 284 by putting up a 72-run partnership with Hopkins. Although wickets kept falling around Hopkins, he kept on attacking the bowlers and led the home team to a massive total of 308 runs. The home team’s
captain top scored in the innings with 120 runs off just 96 balls. He hit eight fours and two towering sixes in his innings. http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Grant-c60671 Elliot
also chipped in with three important wickets in as many overs.
Chasing down a total of 308 required a solid start to the innings, but http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Wellington-c864 lost early wickets and were soon on the back foot. Their top three batsmen were out for a total of 43 runs in the 12th over. However, New Zealand’s star all-rounders
Elliot and James Franklin rescued their team from trouble. The pair gave their team a glimmer of hope for victory with a 112-run partnership. Elliot was unfortunate to be run-out after scoring a match saving innings of 73 runs, but there was still a lot of
work required to be done.
After Franklin got out for 65 runs, it was up to the lower middle order to guide their team to victory. The 20-year-old http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Dewayne-Bowden-c1364 took the team close to victory. Boam got out after a well made 59-run innings, while Bowden remained
unbeaten on 23 off 17 balls. This effort was not good enough for the team to win the match but they came very close. The bad start to the innings cost them the match at the end of the day. Kyle http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mills-c76321 took three wickets for the home side, while veteran fast
bowler Daryl Tuffey along with Michael Bates took two wickets each.
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