Dressing room theft Overshadows Events on the Field

There was an overnight sensation at the WACA when it was revealed that during the night a thief had broken into the internal Victorian change rooms, making off with $10,000 worth of their gear. Amongst the items were pads and bats and shirts and a good quanitiy of compact discs. Matthew Elliott was most distressed about the loss of his bat. I overheard him asking a WACA official to forward it on to the Adelaide Oval (where the Vics play next) if found.

When Mott and Hodge resumed yesterday morning the Vic's were 135 for the loss of two wickets but these two immediately set about getting a big total and making the Western Australian attack look very ordinary.

Hodge played the role of sheet anchor as Mott then Harvey and Harper played their shots and took the total to 303/4 when the Victorian captain Paul Reiffel declared 15 minutes after the lunch break. Mott played a hook, swinging at a high flying short Julian ball - one of few over the middle stump - that took an edge and was a safe catch for Ryan Campbell keeping wickets in the absense of Adam Gilchrist.

Harvey was very unlucky. Hodge pushed a delivery back to the bowler Williams who took the ball in his right hand and then flung it back handed style at the stumps. Umpire Randolph Woolridge did not need to go to the third umpire T. Prue for the decision that Harvey was out of his ground. Hodge (69) and Harper (7) were the not out batsmen at the declaration.

All credit to acting captain Brendon Julian that he did not overbowl himself because his wayward slinging continues, but he was rewarded with the wicket of Mott. Cary and Hogg with one wicket each on the third day bowled without luck on the fourth day. Apart from the run out Williams lacked a bit of the passion his $300 fine gave him on the second day when he was so devestating. Angel had a bad day with the ball, luckless and comparitively expensive he even bowled one no-ball which is out of character. To start with the Western Australians were flat in the field - but seeing a big total looming they mustered their energies and showed more urgency.

With a run rate require of a little over five runs per over the task for WA was a tall order indeed. The opening pair of Hussey and Campbell put on 68 before Hussey went caught by Arnberger off the bowling of David Saker. Inness made good ground to take a diving catch off his own bowling to remove Campbell (who had amassed a drought breaking score of 57.) Julian came in all guns blazing, hit three fours in his short stay of 20 to become Harvey's first victim bowled by a yorker ball.

Meanwhile Baker was playing the sheet anchor role for his side. Dighton went cheaply for nine. Rogers' disappointing game continued with a second ball duck. Hogg and Baker played out the rest of the innings knowing fully well that the time had come to be responsible for the first innings points. At one point the square leg umpire was a lonely and forlorn figure with 10 Victorians crowded around Hogg's bat. Baker ended up on 77* with Hogg only on 7* having faced 58 deliveries.

After the game Paul Reiffel said that the Vics were disappointed with their first innings score - they had wanted to set WA a target of 350. Not much was said about the overnight theft of gear from their rooms.

Brendon Julian was happy to come away with two points from this match. Whilst he was disappointed with his own bowling he said that "Jo-y (Jo Angel) wasn't at his best either but you know we bounced back and I am quite happy that the guys did that. After that first day it was very disappointing but then the boys bounced back pretty well. I think a bit of pride was there, especially mine personally. There are a lot of young guys in the team that really dug in. I thought North-y (Marcus North) batted very well and also Dights Huss Cambo and those sorts of guys dug in as well and that's a positive thing I reckon."

Wayne Clark took the following positives from the game. "I think one was Williams - obviously his performance was very good and a bit of a highlight for the rest of the year hopefully. I though that Cary bowled extremely well. He did a very good job for us last year and I thought his performance was excellent - he was the only one to apply pressure for a long period of time. Our batting in the form of Dighton, Baker who I thought were superb and even Hogg. And of course Hussey carried on where he was and Campbell got a score in the end."

Clark conceded that there were some areas for improvement. "Generally our bowling was very poor at different times especially on Friday I thought there was huge improvement involved in that even in the second innings we sort of just lacked a little bit of penetration on a very flat wicket mind you so there are a lot of areas that we've really got to improve on."