Spotswood has fixed the glaring deficiency that held it back from reaching Victorian Turf Cricket Association finals in the past two seasons.
The Woodsmen are no longer being let down by a brittle top order thanks to the shrewd acquisitions of openers Gene Maurice and Sam Dishon.
The new-look Woodsmen are riding high in the top four of the north-west division after just one blemish in five games.
“Even though we’ve got one of the best batting decks in the competition, it’s been the area where we’ve faltered,” Woodsmen president Haydn Fletcher told Star Weekly.
“The addition of Gene and Sam at the top of the order has taken the pressure off the other guys.
“Having a bit more stability at the top is allowing the guys like Matt Leddin and ‘Browny’ [Jeremy Brown] to come in just that little bit later.
“Ross Horkings is having a purple patch and he’s not having to open or come in when the ball is doing a bit … he’s making the most of the opportunity to bat a bit further down the order.”
Horkings, with 233 runs at 46, is second on the league’s batting aggregate chart with three half-centuries.
Maurice (158 at 31) and Brown (155 at 38) are also top-10 batsmen in the competition.
The Woodsmen have an embarrassment of riches in their bowling attack with veteran Ashley Robertson (11 wickets at 7.55), skipper Andrew Dickinson (12 at 14.25) and all-rounders Maurice (12 at 10.17) and Brown 11 at 15.18) among the top 15 bowlers in the division.
After two consecutive heartbreaking fifth-placed finishes in the past two summers, perhaps the Woodsmen are ready to contend at the pointy end of the season.
“The confidence around the place is pretty good at the moment,” Fletcher said.
In good news for Spotswood’s cricket and football clubs and the Westgate Golf Club, the proposed Western Distributor that it’s hoped will help to cure bottlenecks on western suburbs roads, is unlikely to impact greatly on the three clubs.
There was a fear a new Westgate Bridge off-ramp could have been widened so much that the sports grounds at Donald McLean Reserve would be taken over by the extensions, but new plans might save the clubs from having to relocate.
“Looking at the designs, I think we’ll be all right,” Fletcher said. “There’s talk we may lose a little bit of our training nets, which is a bit of a hassle because a lot of work has gone into those and you’d hate to have to start again.”
