Stumped!

[ataraxia]

Big loss to FHK after Law's 81 (40). Too much for the AX-W attack to handle.

Hoping to get a better result in a T20 against the Plymouth Pirates, but 46-6 isn't a great place to be...

 

[ataraxia]

The Pirates easily chase down 92-8. My specialist bats at 7 & 8 had a partnership of... 48 (65). I mean, we were 15-5... Mike Holroyd, who finished with figures of 4-2-12-4, started with 2-2-0-2. Holroyd also opened and saw his side to a win with 27* (35). Fun game, looking forward to many future fixtures between the two sides.

 

[cnerd123]

Umer Ashraf purchased for 3k by a Div 1 T20 team. I might have made a mistake selling him

Got a selection dilemma for FHK for the SOD game later today. Ivan Lam (26 bat, 37 bwl, RFM who can touch 90 mph) usually plays at 7 and as 3rd quick, but he's on 5 touch and has the Influential trait. I'm tempted to replace him with Andy Li (30 bat, 32 bwl, RFS, 9 touch). The pitch is 14/31/17 - dry, slow and a bit of wear. I'm wondering if the conditions + difference in touch might actually make Andy a more effective bowler, and he strengthens my batting too, plus the extra angle of getting him more IGT to speed up his development for the BD Nat team. Downisde however is that I would then be playing 3 spinners, and bowling a lot of spin with the new ball to compensate.

Big experience gap probably worth factoring in too - Ivan Lam on 15 and Andy Li on 5. Plus Ivan has 13 fielding to Andy's 9 as well.

 

[cnerd123]

ZCC have a massive run chase on hand. 320 to win, chasing away at Moaners Corner. Hope we pull it off.

TMO and Dynamo Morpork are playing at home today. TMO chasing 288 vs Basco, while Morpork have set Wireless Wonders 270.

Great to see all three CW EurAfrica teams in Div 2! Four if you include Jan CC! They're in the same league as Morpork, SOD 2.2. ZCC are in 2.3 and TMO in 2.1

Best of luck @StephenZA , @Magrat Garlick and @jan - hope to see you all in SOD 1.1 sometime soon

ataraXIa and the Honest Hunks (oh yes) are the only other CW teams in SOD Div 2 this season. 5/96, this is the start of the CW takeover

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Not the greatest debut for Margenout, got bogged down a bit and run out for 22. Menno Fouche upped the rate and 270 might be competitive, though we really needed a new ball wicket as they've raced to 52 for no loss after 9 already.

edit: Golden arm Fouche strikes! After 75 (45) what a game he's having

 

[cnerd123]

ZCC are digging a hole. Lost an early wicket and haven't recovered. 31/1 in 13.3 and the RRR is blowing up, leaving quite a bit for the next batters in to do.

The Stiffs bowled better than we have with the new ball tbf. Stronger team, tho we did beat them last time we played.

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Fightback for ZCC and Shkorer is in

9 an over still stiff but who knows

Meanwhile we're about to fall two or three wickets short I think, though maybe their poor tail saves us - no cloud cover killed our seamers today

 

[Magrat Garlick]

43.4	W	Van Heerdens to Price	72 kph	0/10​	offside	attack	thin edge	easy CATCH by the keeper.

Van Heerdens' pies, get their man while they're hot

Two wickets, 30 runs, 38 balls...

 

[cnerd123]

Good win for Morpork in the end! Losses for the rest of us through

ZCC are going to tinker with the team a bit for tomorrow's CWC4 game

 

[ataraxia]

It never seems that both my top and middle order fire. Really disappointing loss.

Oh and I swear Dee has a hidden "fast starter" trait. He lost it again.

 

[Magrat Garlick]

A dramatic 10-run win against a higher rated side, I'll take that. All praise to DEV-Rob for Van Heerdens' fluky wickets

Two key games in CWC4 tomorrow. Severe danger that both Dynamo teams will miss the playoffs if they lose

 

[Jarquis]

Moo managing 18 off their last 8 balls while 9 down to get their second tie in three games

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

Moo managing 18 off their last 8 balls while 9 down to get their second tie in three games

What a repeat of results lol

For the record, I haven't set the orders for both of these matches.

 

[Jarquis]

Do you think they’ll ever restructure the league set up?

 

[Magrat Garlick]

Do you think they’ll ever restructure the league set up?

It's not unlikely. The season when I joined (25/26) they merged eight countries into four zones because most D3s were uncompetitive. That season change went much smoother than the one to season 30

I think they won't do anything until the D3s are fairly full though.

 

[ataraxia]

CWC4B matches well underway. The Hunks have wrapped up a win by chasing down 140 in less than 20 overs. Their top order really is quite powerful.

The other games look to be pretty tough chases. Against Moooo, Zac Chambers hit 54 (53) before perishing on the last ball of the innings. He's managed the jump up to seniors really well despite having pretty low batting skill. He'll probably be replaced when Ibrahim Zahid surpasses him in a few seasons, but he's still a quality prospect.

 

[SillyCowCorner1]

At 131/1 chasing 245 I feel like this is too good to be true.

I can sense a collapse coming.

 

[Jarquis]

Mooo doing me a solid. I’m coming for you both.

 

[cnerd123]

Big win there for Moooo! CWC4 Div 2 heating up.

Got a selection dilemma for FHK for the SOD game later today. Ivan Lam (26 bat, 37 bwl, RFM who can touch 90 mph) usually plays at 7 and as 3rd quick, but he's on 5 touch and has the Influential trait. I'm tempted to replace him with Andy Li (30 bat, 32 bwl, RFS, 9 touch). The pitch is 14/31/17 - dry, slow and a bit of wear. I'm wondering if the conditions + difference in touch might actually make Andy a more effective bowler, and he strengthens my batting too, plus the extra angle of getting him more IGT to speed up his development for the BD Nat team. Downisde however is that I would then be playing 3 spinners, and bowling a lot of spin with the new ball to compensate.

Big experience gap probably worth factoring in too - Ivan Lam on 15 and Andy Li on 5. Plus Ivan has 13 fielding to Andy's 9 as well.

So I went with Andy Li, and we won the game He scored 32 off 38 as we piled on 287/8, and then took 2/43 in 8.1 overs (avg ball quality 6.1) as we bowled them out for 215. 58k ratings for FHK vs 52k for our opponents. Lester Shum responded fabulously to taking the new ball, this might be a strategy we repeat more often. FHK are in SOD Div 2 as well, hopefully they manage to stay up this season!

Double headers vs @Charlie B in the CWC4 today. ZCC vs The Buy Ins and FHK vs Jura CC. ZCC will be resting several senior players - I think we should still win, but The Wild Geese are stiff opponents. Should be a fun match. FHK might stay unchanged for the SOD yesterday. Pitch should be flat, so lets see if 3 spinners works out.

 

[cnerd123]

Do you think they’ll ever restructure the league set up?

I'm actually working on a proposal to post on the forums. I think 1 up 3 down is too harsh. We could reduce the number of Div 3 leagues have just 2 teams relegate from Div 2 instead, and then reduce the number of Div 4 leagues too so that just 1 team relegates from each Div 3. This way you keep human-run teams in leagues filled with other human teams across all levels, while also making Div 2 a bit more forgiving. Right now it's ridiculously cut throat, a run of bad luck or losing a key player to injury can lead to relegation.