By Randall Woodley
It was a very busy and successful week for the Tewantin-Noosa Thunder Cricket Club with the ‘Turning on of the Lights’ at Read Park last Thursday night and winning two of their three T20 Games contested.
The lights, erected at a cost of $500000 which was obtained through a government grant were officially turned on by the Federal Member for Wide Bay, Mr Llew O’Brien. The lights, now considered the best outside the Brisbane area, were a culmination of much work by the club’s committee.
Immediately afterwards the First Grade team played a T20 match against the Nambour Cutters. Nambour batted first and did not seemed bothered with the lights, scoring a commendable 5 for 152, with their top scorer recording 64. Best of the TNT bowlers were Jarrod Officer 2-35, Tom Freshwater 1-27 and Scott Aufderheide restricting the batsmen to only 11 runs off his 3 overs. Batting second the large number of supporters were entertained by Chris Wright who hit 44 off 21 balls, a solid 52 not out off 41 balls from the experienced Jarrod Officer and Dom Taylor 33 not out. The target was reached in the 17th over giving the team four wins out of four matches in the T20 round robin tournament.
On Saturday the team went south to Buderim and in the morning played the unbeaten Glasshouse club. The wicket turned out to be “low and slow” and it was obvious that both bowling and batting were going to be difficult, especially with all the boys backing up from their last game on Thursday night. However, the team lifted and with intelligent bowling and good fielding kept the Ranger’s batters to 124 for the loss of 3 wickets. In T20 matches tight bowling is nearly as important as taking wickets and the TNT’s opening pair of Aufderheide and Freshwater did this, conceding only 29 runs off their combined 8 overs.
In reply the TNT team kept up the required run rate and passed the target in the last over to give the team their fifth win. It was again Jarrod Officer who was the standout batsman, remaining not out on 60 off 51 balls. Teenager Sam Baker was there at the end on 21 not out. This win saw the team lock up a Semi-Final spot to be played on the weekend of 10-11 October weekend.
In the after noon the team took on the Maroochydore Swans who had been beaten by Gympie in the morning game. By now the pitch was becoming even slower and with tiredness a factor the boys could not get over the line. Bowling tightly again and backed up by the fielders the Swans were restricted to be 6 for 123 after their 20 overs. Best bowlers were again Freshwater and Aufderheide with a wicket each and Jake Dennien with two.
When batting the TNT team had problems forming partnerships and were eventually all out for 95. Top scores were veteran Andrew Kartzmann with 30 not out and captain Jake Dennien 25.
Next Thursday night the team play Coolum under lights at Read Park to finish the 7 match T 20 series and on Saturday play Glasshouse Rangers at home in the first of the 50 Overs matches.
