Tara Murray
After a number of close calls, Gellibrand is finally premiers of the Victorian Turf Cricket Association Evans-Clark Shield competition.
After making finals the past four seasons, Gellibrand was able to find a way to break through against Moonee Valley on the weekend.
It had been 22 years since the club’s last men’s first XI premiership.
President Mark Keating said there were a lot of celebrations following the final wicket.
“Since Paul Hetherington has been at the club, the last five years, we’ve lost a grand final and been knocked out in three semi finals,” he said.
“We’ve been good at winning games during the home and away season, but we couldn’t get that elusive premiership.”
For much of the game, Moonee Valley was the better side and seemed destined for the premiership.
Gellibrand batted on day one and at 6-83 were in trouble. Keating said their focus at that point was to just make sure they could post a competitive score.
“We had a really good partnership of 99 that got us back into the game,” he said. “One of those batters played seconds and thirds for most of the year and Ross [Thomasson] come in after Christmas and they have both played a role for us and put us back in the game.
“At 6-83 we were saying if we could try to get 150 and anything more than that is a bonus.”
Michael Keating top scored with 56.
Moonee Valley started well with the bat and at 1-99 was in control of the game once again.
Three wickets near tea gave Gellibrand a glimmer of hope.
“They were then 4-150,” Keating said. “They had one guy batting really well and we felt behind in the game.
“We had kept the run rate tight and they needed four and half runs an over. They had to keep pushing the score and took some risks and we kept taking wickets.
Moonee Valley was bowled out of 199 in the 78th over.
Jacob Macdonald took 4-43, while Brayden Macdonald took three wickets.
Michael Keating was named player of the match, making the premiership even more special for his father Mark.
Mark Keating said one of the most impressive things for him was that seven of the 12 players had come through juniors at the club.
He said they were keen for those players to be the core group and they could build around them.
Gellibrand will be promoted and play in division 3 next season. Keating said they were keen for the new challenge.
“We only went up into division 4 about three or four years ago and we’ve been competitive there.
“We’ll look to recruit to try and be competitive in division 3.”
