Tag: Sydney Smash

Brilliant Bray Bosses Sydney Smash

A look back at today’s ‘Sydney Smash’ – Thunder v Sixers – in the WBBL, including a historic performance from Caoimhe Bray and a photo gallery featuring pictures taken with three cameras.

Today in the Women’s Big Bash League saw the Sydney Smash – Thunder hosting Sixers at Drummoyne, just west of Sydney. This post looks back at a bizarre game that ended up being dominated by the youngest player involved.

SIXERS SLUMP AFTER STRONG START

Sydney Thunder skipper Phoebe Litchfield won the toss and chose to bowl first, a decision that her cross-city counterpart Ashleigh Gardner would also have made had she been the one to win the toss. Each side had a youngster in the ranks, Thunder giving a debut to 18 year old all rounder Lucy Finn, while Sixers had 16 year old bowling all rounder Caiomhe Bray (that given name is pronounced like ‘Keeva’ just for the record).

Ellyse Perry was out fairly early, pinned LBW by Georgia Voll with just 16 on the board. Thereafter, with Sophia Dunkley in prime form, and Alyssa Healy taking full toll of a few loose balls things initially looked bright for the Sixers. Their innings took a dramatic turn when Healy tried to go after one from Shabnim Ismail and succeeded only in picking out Samantha Bates who made no mistake with the catch. That was 76-2, and off the last ball of the tenth over Dunkley fell for 43, pinned LBW by Sri Lankan veteran Chamari Athapaththu to make it 80-3 at the halfway stage of the innings. In the second half of the Sixers innings wickets tumbled regularly, with the shining exception of English spin bowling all rounder Mady Villiers who emerged as third top scorer of the innings, with an unbeaten 24. A final total of 142-9 looked on the meagre side, especially from that high water mark of 76-1 after 8.4 overs…

THUNDER TUMBLE

…Sixers needed to start well, and veteran seamer Lauren Cheatle struck with the fourth ball of the Thunder innings, having Voll caught by Villiers to make it 2-1. Then the other new ball bowler, Maitlan Brown, struck twice more, first accepting a soft return chance to dismiss the other opener Tahlia Wilson for 7, and then having the vastly experienced Heather Knight feather one through to Healy for 6 to make it 19-3 in the fourth over. Neither Phoebe Litchfield nor Anika Learoyd played fluently, but they held the fort together until the last ball of the seventh over, bowled by the youngster Bray. Litchfield, who had reached 8 from 14 balls tried to attack against Bray and succeeded in being caught by Gardner to make it 33-4. The next over yielded nine runs, before it was back to Bray, and the biggest events of the night. The first ball of the ninth over did for Learoyd, bowling her for 11 to make it 42-5. That brought the explosive Laura Harris to the crease. Harris tried to do her thing off her first ball and was brilliantly caught by a diving Erin Burns for 0 to give the 16 year old Bray a hat trick comprising three front line batters, some 175 years after All-England skipper Heathfield Harman Stephenson caused the term to be coined by dismissing three batters with successive balls in a match in Sheffield, which led to the crowd, impressed by the performance, to pass round a hat for a collection and present both hat and contents to Stephenson. Incidentally, though this match was flawless in this regard this edition of the WBBL had not overall been notable for catches being held. That was 42-6, and Lucy Finn came to the crease. Four balls into the second half of the innings Athapaththu holed out to Gardner to give Bray her fourth scalp of the innings and make it 49-3, the Sri Lankan managing only 3 (6). Bray had two balls of her allocation left to make it a five-for, but was not able to do so. However, her final 4-0-15-4 including the hat trick had settled who would be named Player of the Match. Thunder’s own youngster, Finn, now took centre stage, as she, with good support from tail enders Taneale Peschel and Shabnim Ismail (number 11 Samantha Bates not being required in the end) proceeded to produce an innings that exposed just how badly her supposed betters had handled their duties. She just missed on reaching 50, but her 49 not out, in the course of which she never looked in any trouble was the highest score of the match on either side – quite something for a debutant who came into the match considered more of a bowler than a batter (and though, like all else, it was overshadowed by Bray’s performance 3-0-27-1 on professional T20 debut is no one’s idea of a failure). Thunder with this late revival reached 118-8, beaten by 24 runs.

PHOTOGRAPHS

This gallery features images taken with three cameras – the Nikon Coolpix B500 that was my first choice camera until it died on Tuesday morning, the Canon EOS 4000D that is my reserve camera, and the Panasonic DC-FZ82D which I ordered on Wednesday and arrived yesterday and is now my new first choice camera…

This gallery consists of the last pictures with the Nikon.
The pictures in this gallery were taken with the Canon…
…and starting with this one, the Panasonic.
I used this Canadian train coin to test the Panasonic’s ability to handle detail.
The Red Mount Chapel.

An Epic Sydney Smash

An account of today’s Sydney Smash (Sydney Sixers v Sydney Thunder) match in the Big Bash League, and a photo gallery, highlighted by a particularly fine Little Egret at the meeting point of Nar and Great Ouse.

The Sydney Smash (as mentioned in my previous post) is the name given to the derby between the two Sydney outfits in the Big Bash League. This post looks at today’s instalment which was an absolute classic.

THE FIRST 30 OVERS

The match was of a good standard without promising the spectacular developments that came in its final quarter. Sydney Sixers won the bat flip and put Sydney Thunder in to bat. The Thunder innings was dominated by an 88=run stand for the third wicket between Cameron Bancroft and Oliver Davies. Bancroft scored 70 off 52 balls, and Oliver Davies 47 off 34 balls. Joel Davies, Oliver’s brother, was in the Sixers line up and had a poor day, recording 3-0-36-0. His allocation was completed by Todd Murphy, which proved a poor decision by the Sixers, as Murphy’s sole over went for 20. Akeal Hosein (West Indies, left arm spin) had 2-23 from his four overs, and Ben Dwarshuis (Australia, left arm fast medium, left handed bat), of whom there will be more later had 2-26 from his four overs. Thunder had 163-5 from their 20 overs, respectable but not invincible. The first 10 overs of the Sixers response looked a classic case of laying the groundwork – without doing anything special Sixers were 79-2 at the halfway point of the chase, just a fraction behind the required rate but with eight wickets standing and a two over Power Surge to come. Many would have concurred with my own opinion expressed at the time on mastodon (my social media platform of choice) that Sixers were favourites…

OVERS 31-35

A combination of some disciplined bowling by Thunder and a horror show from Moises Henriques (he is of Portuguese descent for those wondering about the name). First of all Henriques barbecued his third wicket partner Jack Edwards who was going superbly at the time, by setting off for a very optimistic single with Edwards going to the danger end. A direct hit throw had Edwards sufficiently short of his ground that he did not wait for the TV replay before turning for the pavilion. Having handed Thunder an opening, Henriques helped to make it a wider one by becoming badly bogged down. By the end of the 15th over Sixers were 107-3, needing 57 off the last five overs to win…

OVERS 36-40

Jordan Silk had struggled to get going, and when Henriques fell to the second ball of the 16th, with the Power Surge just taken, it was 108-4, 56 needed off 4.4 overs, which works out at exactly two per ball. Lachlan Shaw now joined Silk, and immediately hit his first ball for four. The first Power Surge over yielded 10 runs and that wicket of Henriques (for 17 off 22 balls). The second, entrusted to Nathan McAndrew, reignited the chase, Silk at last finding his touch. In total 17 came from it and no wicket, which meant that 30 were needed off the last three overs. Daniel Sams, vastly experienced, bowled the 18th over, and for five balls looked to be winning it for his side. The sixth ball went for four, which reduced the ask to 24 off the final two overs, but even with the four only six had come from the over. Ferguson, the New Zealand quick, was given the 19th in the hope that he could kill the chase before the final over. When he shattered Shaw’s stumps with the first ball thereof it looked a good call. Dwarshuis hit the second ball of the over for a massive six to start his innings in emphatic style, but only three further runs accrued from the rest of the over. Sixers needed 15 off the last over, and Thunder would have been the happier side at that point. However gambling on Ferguson for the 19th over meant that the final over was in the hands of off spinner Chris Green. When just five came off the first three balls (2,2,1) it still looked good for Thunder. However Green now lost his bearings and sent down two consecutive wides to reduce the ask to eight. A single of the next delivery brought Dwarshuis on to strike with seven needed off two balls. Green bowled a juicy full toss, just a fraction outside off and Dwarshuis, for all that he is more bowler than batter, was plenty good enough to dispatch it way, way over wide long on for six to level the scores. The final delivery was just short of a length and in line with middle and leg stumps, and Dwarshuis coolly turned into the onside for the winning single. Dwarshuis ended with 20* (8), Silk with 36* (25). Dwarshuis’ late blitz in conjunction with his bowling efforts secured him the Player of the Match award. A full scorecard of this classic contest can be seen here.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Today’s gallery starts with lots 638 and 641 from what will be the March 2025 auction at James and Sons, but the rest of the pictures are from yesterday afternoon and today…