Harvey-Benger keep winning streak alive

Harvey-Benger’s fourth grade side kept their winning streak going, scoring a six-wicket victory over Colts Gold on Saturday.
The club scored 131 to the Colts’ 127 off the back of an inspired five-wicket haul to swing bowler Dave Cooper.
Winning the toss for the sixth straight match, Harvey-Benger decided to change things up and field first in perfect cricketing conditions.
It was Colts who gained the early ascendancy, however, batting patiently and scoring steadily on a magnificent Harvey wicket.
Things took a turn for the worse before 10 overs had been played, when in-form opening batsman Zack Fimmano dived for a ball at gully and dislocated his shoulder. Fimmano could play no further part in the game, leaving Harvey-Benger with 10 fielders until fill-in Tyson Italiano could join the team.
Cruelly, it was Colts who would next be impacted by injury. Captain and opening batsman Wayne Warrick, going easy to that point, pulled his hamstring and needed to leave the field.
It was a glitch Harvey-Benger worked hard to capitalise on. The luckless Connor Daley bowled well in the lead up to drinks, bowling 8 straight overs and finishing with 0-21 despite several balls lobbing just over fielders.
With Colts coming out of the drinks break at 0-80 Harvey-Benger needed something special to turn the match around. Enter Dave Cooper.
Bowling typically good lengths and lines with movement in the air, Cooper tightened the scoring forcing the Colts batsmen to push at the ball.
After getting two catches to fly to Rob Fitzgerald at point and taking a return catch himself, you could see that Cooper was up and about.
After taking a simple catch at cover for the fourth wicket, skipper Rowan Morrison exceeded himself with a full stretch one-handed catch to send the home side into raucous cheers for Cooper's 5-for.
After this the Colts batting line-up fell away quickly to be all out for 127.
Pushing through the overs it was another good bowling performance from left arm spinner Jarod Maughan, who finished with 3-20 from his seven overs.
With Fimmano unavailable to open the batting it was Rob Fitzgerald, playing his first match for the year, who was given the opportunity to open the batting with regular opener Maughan.
The pair started confidently too, seeing the score to 46 before a lapse in concentration resulted in Maughan being bowled for 25.
Fitzgerald followed soon afterwards for 28, again losing concentration when he was seemingly cruising.
A string of small partnerships chipped away at the total, but with a number of injured players. Harvey-Benger remained wary.
It was the classy Brayden Green who anchored the chase though, his 34 not out guiding the team towards victory.
This set the platform for captain Morrison to join the finishers club, driving a ball through mid wicket for four to go past the Colts total.
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