Footscray finished its Victorian Premier Cricket season with another promising performance on Saturday, knocking off fourth placed Casey South Melbourne.
On day one of the clash, the Dogs were sent in to bat and after a shaky start with two of their best batsmen falling early. It was left to young guns Aiman Nadeem (93) and Mitch Jamieson (45) who piled on a strong 120 run partnership to get the innings back on track.
After finishing on 7-279 after only 94 overs the Dogs had the option to bat out the remaining six overs on Saturday morning. With Dylan Kight (61*) and Jay Vine (26*) still at the crease, coach Dale McDonald said they were always probably going to bat on.
“Given we knew that there was a state second XI game there last week so the ground was a lot quicker and the wicket was probably a lot flatter,” he said.
“To get 10 wickets on that ground was a feat in itself, so you have to put some scoreboard pressure on there and obviously that meant we would need to bat on and get some more runs.”
The Dogs ended up getting bowled out for 311 in the 100th over. Kight finished on 84 and Vine 31.
With the ball the Dogs worked hard, with Vine leading the way with 4-67. Casey were unable to chase the Dogs down, finishing 81 overs on 7-277.
Following last season’s straight-set finals exit, club greats Dean Russ and Dan Sartori left the club. However, after a full season with a new looking list, including featuring 10 debutants in the first XI McDonald said he is comfortable with where the club is at.
Footscray ended the year with a six win, six loss record.
“There’s still a bit of work to be done for next year but I think the club’s in a really good position, knowing that we’ve had ten debutants come through and they can hold first XI positions going forward,” he said.
“There’s not a hell of a lot that we would actually need to change, when you lose those senior players that we have lost, it actually fast tracks the development of other players and not just in the first XI.
“From fours to threes, threes to twos and twos to ones, those guys then have to work a bit harder and get a greater understanding of what it takes to play at that higher grade, so it will certainly hold us in good stead moving forward.”
