Former Proteas help Old Eds masters beat Pirates
ILLOVO – Adam Bacher and Zander de Bruyn play for Old Eds in a tournament for over 40s.
Having former Protea cricketers in the side gave Old Edwardians Cricket Club the confidence they needed to record a good win against local rivals Pirates Cricket Club in a match featuring players over the age of 40.
Adam Bacher and Zander de Bruyn turned up to play at the Wanderers Masters Cricket League game on 25 May. This was the second match of the tournament after Wanderers beat Vagabonds two weeks earlier.
Pirates batted first but fell to 15 runs for the loss of three wickets early, before captain Dean Laing scored a defiant 55 off 30 balls to lift the side to 149/4 in their allotted 25 overs.
Mike Ritchie was the chief destructor in the Old Eds bowling attack. He took two wickets for seven runs in his four overs. Former Protea Bacher bowled one over and went for 11 runs, while De Bruyn was economical, giving away 16 runs in four overs.
Old Eds only needed 18.4 overs to chase the runs down, largely thanks to Grant Celliers (56 off 41 balls) and captain Craig Lyons (43 off 35). De Bruyn and Bacher had the honour of carrying Old Eds over the line at the end, and both recorded not-outs, scoring 16 and 21 runs respectively.
“It was a good team effort,” Lyons said afterwards. “Our stars helped us but it went right straight away with our bowlers getting Pirates wickets early. We fielded well too.”
Pirates captain Laing agreed that the start of his side’s innings was where it went wrong.
“We didn’t score enough runs early and Old Eds found their tactics and played smarter cricket,” he said. “For our next game, we will work on our approach in the early overs.”
Next, Pirates will play Wanderers on 1 June and Old Eds will play Vagabonds on 8 June.
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