Taranaki women lose in shortened match

Travis Stewart

New Plymouth Physio Taranaki Women’s team hosted the ladies from Wairarapa at Pukekura Park on Sunday in round three of the Mike Shrimpton Trophy.

With rain in the forecast leading up to the game and in the forecast for Sunday the game looked in doubt, but the weather gods let the wind blow and the ladies managed to get a shortened 20 over match in after an early lunch was taken.

Kate Baxter won the toss and sent Wairarapa into bat on a pitch that looked like runs would be hard to come by.

Opening the bowling for Taranaki was Taila Hurley who was coming off the back of a very impressive game vs Manawatu and she did not disappoint again with a very economical 4 overs for 14. The other opening bowler for Taranaki was Charlotte Stent and the young left arm seamer showed once again she one to watch-out for in the future. Stent bowled very nice lines and made it very difficult for the Wairarapa openers to get going and was unlucky not to have a couple of wickets early in her spell.

With the change of bowlers came the 1st wicket to the bowling of Amy Foreman as she had Simms caught by one of the two debutants, Azaria Lander. Four runs later Amy’s sister Grace Foreman got into the action as she found the edge of Lyford’s bat with Tarnaki keeper Jessie Hollard completing the catch. Wairarapa found themselves 44-2 half way through their innings. Wairarapa had a little partnership going with Emma McLeod and Ella Southey until Captain Kate Baxter returned to the bowling crease to dismiss Southey. Young Spin bowler Caitlin Marshall came on to close-out the innings and she did a fine job picking up the key wicket of Emma Mcleod for 33. Next over from Baxter saw some sharp keeping from Hollard to stump Jones-Dennes, and Taranaki now had the visitors 76-5 in the 17th over. With the last over to be bowled by Caitlin Marshall Wairarapa would’ve liked a big over but it was all Marshall to start with back-to-back wickets of Roseingrave and Taylor and Marshall would finish with figures of 3 for 11 and Wairarapa would end their innings with 93 for 7 from their 20 overs.

The Taranaki innings did not get of to the start they would have wanted with the wicket of Aimee Wisnewski in the 3rd over for 3 and the home team 13 for 1. Maree Heal came to the crease and combined with opener Jess Hollard to get the innings back on track until Heal was caught on the boundary pulling the ball off the bowling of Southey, Taranaki now 37-2 was in trouble again as the very next ball saw Hollard bowled. Hollard was a tad unlucky with a bottom edge that played onto her stumps and she was out for 19 of 22 balls. Wairarapa’s bowlers made the run scoring hard with good lines and well-placed fielders on the leg side. The Wairarapa boundary fielders were fantastic as they easily saved 20 runs with their fielding on the fence. Taranaki struggled to get any momentum and they lost the wickets of captain Kate Baxter and Amy Foreman with only 20 runs added to the score. The required run rate was increasing and the pressure was coming on the Taranaki batters, after 17 overs Taranaki required a further 24 runs. Unfortunately the target proved out of reach as they finished on 78 for 7.

Next up for Taranaki is a game vs Hawkes Bay in Whanganui this coming Sunday the 12th of December.