Harper Sercombe
Footscray is on the back foot in their Victorian Premier Cricket two-day clash against Northcote.
The Bulldogs lost the toss and were sent to the field on Saturday and stuck immediately when Jermaine Levy got Elliot Brandon-Jones on the fifth ball of the innings.
However, it was tough going from there with the other opening batsman Jonty Rushton making 126, helping the Dragons to 6-358 at the conclusion of their 90 overs.
First-year captain Dylan Brasher said he was a bit disappointed with the result.
“We gained a little bit of momentum against the Bombers [Essendon] last week and we did really well against them,” he said. “Northcote had some struggles earlier in the year so we were full of confidence.
“It was a bit disappointing on the weekend, we probably didn’t quite bowl enough good balls in the right areas and they had a few batters get away, so it was just one of those days.
“The wicket looked pretty good in the morning, our curator does a pretty good job there, and he said it was pretty good and looked pretty hard and fast, we probably would have looked to have a bat as well.
“We played pretty well in the game before and a few batters got a bit of confidence, we were looking to get on the front foot and we couldn’t quite do that and they got away from us a little bit.”
The Bulldogs also welcomed a new arrival to their club this week with Max Hatzoglou putting on the keeping gloves as long-time keeper Dylan Kight welcomed a new arrival of his own.
“We had a few conversations with him [Hatzoglou] earlier in the preseason about coming over and I don’t think he was quite getting the opportunities at Melbourne Uni that he was after,” Brasher said.
“We needed a keeper and Dylan Kight missed a few games which was unfortunate for us but good for him with the arrival of a newborn.
“He [Hatzoglou] fit the mould for this game and hopefully he can do pretty well for the rest of the year.
“His first night of training was last Thursday night, so he hasn’t had too much time to adjust but in weird circumstances was picked in his first game which is exciting because he’s obviously a very good player.”
As the Bulldogs chase down the big total ahead of them, Brasher is hoping their youth can prevail.
“I think our batters will have the confidence after the last game,” he said.
“Our middle order is pretty young, we have a few guys who are 17, 18 batting in the middle order.
“We lost a lot of experience at the end of last year and it’s pretty hard to replace that overnight.
“It’s a pretty big total but someone will have to get in and get a big score but we’ll see how we go.”
