Miscellaneous

Bowlers give St. Catherine edge

Queen's Park St

Haydn Gill
11-Jun-2000
Queen's Park St. Catherine 253, Spartan 196-9
For most of the afternoon, their fast bowlers were guilty of consistently over-stepping the front crease, occasionally pounding in the ball too short and being very tardy in their over-rate.
Yet, BNB St. Catherine are within sight of first innings points against Big B Spartan.
There were times when the St. Philip men bowled splendidly.
Take, for example, Brian Shepherd's unplayable yorker that bowled Philo Wallace or his similarly full-length ball that trapped Ryan Burke lbw.
Soon after, the same Shepherd was being punished by Kerry Lucas with three successive boundaries, the last two powerfully pulled away.
St. Catherine were cock-a-hoop after they removed Wallace, Burke and Corey Yearwood with only 13 runs on the tins.
But, they allowed the home team to fight back.
Lucas, who made a polished 60, and Hattian Graham, with an enterprising 38, were at the heart of the revival.
St. Catherine's cause, however, was not helped by the four potential dismissals that were negated by no-ball calls.
When Graham, on 15, was bowled by such a delivery from Rodney Straughn, it was the 19th no-ball sent down by St. Catherine within the first 23 overs.
Victor Skeete, one of the culprits, made up for it by removing Graham and Lucas after the pair had added 71 in an hour.
Graham, whose first scoring stroke was a hooked six off Shepherd, was bowled off the inside edge, while Lucas was out in disappointing fashion when his intended pull resulted in a simple caught-and-bowled.
When Spartan were offered the option of going off for bad light just after 6 p.m., St. Catherine had completed only 42 off their 55 overs.
It was an almost unacceptable over-rate, but St. Catherine might say that it does not matter.