Pirates of the St Lawrence versus Quebec Juniors
Sunday 14 September 2014
by Sparky Rodmell

Youth, as they say, shall have its fling. And it did so today. At the expense of the Pirates. But it did so quite impressively, and in a way that bodes well for the future of cricket in Quebec.

The first thing the Pirates noticed, as they rolled up characteristically ten to fifteen minutes late, was that instead of there being a slow half hour as normal while they set things up while waiting for the opposition to show up. Their opponents were already at the ground and warming up enthusiastically. It set the tone for a day when the Pirates were a bit too relaxed and waited too long, both batting and fielding, to counter the energetic approach of Quebec Juniors.

Pirates batted first in frigid conditions. They began cautiously, waiting to see how the cold and the damp would affect the play, and what their opponents had in the way of bowling. The overcast weather brought with it a good amount of late swing for the Juniors, some of whom struggled at first to find their line as a result, and shelled a lot of wides. But once Juniors’ bowlers found a rhythm, Pirates found themselves contained by the good balls and failed to make enough of the loose ones to start building a total.

Two of Juniors’ bowlers stood out. Terron sensibly avoided the mistake of trying to bowl too fast for the conditions and instead made effective use of his height to get some unexpectedly good bounce out of a damp pitch. And Afran bowled a mostly-consistent line around off, restricting the opening batters to occasional singles and taking Mandal’s wicket early on.

So Pirates found themselves two-thirds of the way through the innings with not nearly enough runs. Pariat launched an effective attack and added 47, but wickets fell around him and the innings never quite accelerated in the way that it needed to. Pirates assembled a just-about-respectable 146 for 8 by lunchtime, and it seemed that a promisingly-close contest beckoned.

And Juniors, to their credit, took the initiative impressively in their innings. Terron set the tone with some audacious front-foot driving: a highlight of his innings came when he defied the coaching manual by heaving a good-length off-stump ball from Islam for six into the woods behind mid-wicket, before he finally over-reached himself by charging down the track to a more subtly-flighted one from Woodall that just took the top of off stump. Pirates’ fielding suffered from some cold-weather slowness, and some unnecessary runs were given away. Raiyan joined the batting with a very well-crafted attack, staying on the back foot to give himself time to place cross-batted swats as the Pirates struggled to find a consistent length.

Juniors’ running was also excellent, and they took tight singles or turned ones into twos to stay up to the required scoring rate throughout. As defeat loomed, the Pirates rediscovered an aggressive fielding posture as they dived to block hard cover drives and Khanna snaffled a catch at mid-wicket. But it was too late. Juniors reached the target with four overs to spare, Raiyan undefeated on 68, and their energy had brought them a deserved victory on a slow day for the Pirates.

Pirates of the St Lawrence versus Quebec Juniors
Sunday 14 September 2014
The Candy Fields, Mont-Saint-Hilaire
Match type: 30 overs per side (11 wickets)
Result: Quebec Juniors won by 7 wickets

Pirates of the St Lawrence Innings

Extras 40 (Byes 3, Leg Byes 1 No Balls 8, Wides 28)
Total 146 for 8 in 30 overs

FoW (1-17, 2-35, 3-56, 4-78, 5-111, 6-126, 7-140, 8-144)

Quebec Juniors Innings

Extras 21 (Byes 9, Leg Byes 1, No Balls 0, Wides 11)
Total 147 for 3 in 26 overs

FoW (1-20, 2-88, 3-133)