Season 1995/96 - The Dream Comes True

During the winter the Karingal Cricket Club approached Long Island seeking a merger. The Club’s Annual Meeting decided that the merger should not proceed. As far as Long Island was concerned a democratic decision had been made and that should have been that. However the Frankston City Council decided that the McClelland Drive Oval should be closed and that the Long Island Cricket Club should relocate. A number of options were mooted and the Club decided on the Ballam Park area, specifically the Ballam Park South Oval. The Oval was not suitable for senior cricket but the Council agreed to re-site the pitch and the Club had to go-ahead.

While the Council had decided to relocate the Club to the Ballam Park Oval, the Karingal Cricket Club was far from happy. A motion to the Mornington Peninsula Cricket Association which was aimed at barring Long Island from the area was defeated and Karingal had to put up with its nearest neighbours being literally next door - in fact even closer than the two Clubs were when our headquarters were at Worland Park. Of course in those days we were playing in Sub-District and Karingal was a force in Provincial. In 1995/96 however Karingal would be playing in the District competition and we were about to make inroads into the MPCA in a very big way.

Needless to say the MPCA Clubs saw no sense to the motion and it was overwhelmingly defeated. This meant that cricket could proceed.

The Long Island Cricket Club, unperturbed with the politics of it all decided to go about its business and concentrate on playing the game - and play it it did - with great success. New players who enjoyed the success were Michael Dixon, Malcolm Lilley and former Karingal opening bat Peter Schreiner. In addition, Cameron Bicknell, Adrian Spider Burton, Adam Chubb, Paul Henderson, Bob Kent and Stuart Finn McLeod resumed playing.

Players who departed were retirees Brian Chapman ( 48 games, 475 runs & 92 wickets @ 15.93), Jim Chubb (44 games & 1389 runs @ 33.88%), Antony Griffin (68 games, 952 runs & 42 wickets @ 14.95%), Steve Griffin (97 games, 1487 runs @ 23.98% & 236 wickets @ 14.69%), Sam Griffiths, Bob Hough (105 games, 3220 runs @ 49.54 & 162 wickets @ 14.19%), Mal Humphrey, Grant Jefferies, Stuart Kahle, Kim Murphy, Geoff Trees Palmer (51 games, 1385 runs @ 36.45% & 114 wickets @ 16.80%), Michael Scott, Tony Smith , Ian Stevenson, Norm Stickland (149 games, 1666 runs @ 14.24% & 226 wickets @ 20.62%), Clarrie Swan (121 games, 1770 runs @ 16.24% & 174 wickets @ 18.28%)and Peter Watson (171 games, 1812 runs @ 16.18% & 189 wickets @ 17.22%)while John Forrest left to try his luck with Frankston Peninsula. Jeff Boag, Trevor Johnston and Kieran McCluskey also left only to resume at a later date. Two other players left - Graham Doc Vose who left to take up the role of Captain/Coach of the Red Hill Cricket Club and Kevin Ryan who decided to make the change also - the chance to play 1st XI cricket understandedly being the main reason. Both players left with the Club’s good wishes.

SEMI-FINALS

1sts : Long Island 6/109 (P.Conell 30) defeated Balnarring 9/107 (P.Hartle 5/37)

The 1sts’ game became a 1-Day affair when rain and an extremely wet Hastings ground precluded play on the 1st day. Balnarring batted first and found runs hard to come by, particularly against Arnie, who was terrific for his 5 wickets. Potto started proceedings brightly and for a while things were looking bright, but fading light made things difficult. In the end Johnno decided that enough was enough and hit an enormous 6 to ruin Balnarring’s season.

3rds : Long Island 6/256 (G.Measham 50, C.Burke 37, S.McLeod 96no)
defeated Baden Powell 129 (G.Measham 4/42, G.Lamb 4/15)

The 3rds powered their way through this with Finn in great touch and stiff to miss his ton, Meash too was in good form and Chris Burke was his usual self - annoying hell out of the bowlers. With the ball Meash and Greg Lamb were far too good and we stepped up to the Grand Final with a minimum of fuss.

4ths : Long Island 122 (P.Worland 43) lost to Mt Eliza 199 (P.Worland 5/60, K.Worland 5/71)

The Worlands restricted the Mounties to 199 - Peter bowled 28 overs and Kieran 33. We struggled with the bat - at one stage we were 8/36 but Kieran made 15 and Peter helped David Smith (25 not out) put on 48 for the last wicket - but we still missed out by 77 runs.

5ths : Long Island 189 (T.Ryan 82) defeated Tyabb 134 (P.Wilkinson 3/24, P.Van Raay 3/37)

This looked like being a very easy win when we cruised to 4/165 with the Rev and Peerless (31) well on top but the Yabbie bowlers had other ideas and our last 6 wickets fell for 14. Our bowlers though gave them no respite and we took the match by 55 runs and more importantly, a huge step towards the Premiership.

U 16’s East: Long Island 2/127 L.Van Raay 31no, D.Collins 31no, A.Collins 28, J.Murphy 28
defeated Frankston East 10/123 J.DeSilva 5/22

U 14’s East: Long Island 9/148 (M.Burke 47, S.Coates 45) defeated Mt Eliza 10/133 (C.Hay 3/35)

This one was over soon after the lunch break and the boys were given the afternoon off.

U14's West: Long Island 10/101 D.Thompson 19, L.Koch 18, L.Murphy 16, P.Connolly 15
lost to Langwarrin 10/104 A.Rath 2/8, L.Murphy 2/20, B.Gook 2/25

A hard loss for the boys, so close

GRAND FINALS

Under 14 East Grand Final

Under 16 East Grand Final

5th XI

Unfortunately this game was lost early on the first day when we capitulated for a meagre 39. We then dismissed the Mounties for 64 with Paddy again in his usual finals’ form taking 6/29. We did much better in the 2nd Innings - scoring 250 with Marty and the Rev amongst the runs but they were able to hold on - 104 runs in 75 overs - and we failed in our mission by 4 wickets.

3rd XI

The 3rds showed that they were by far the best team in that Grade for the Season by easily defeating Mornington in the Grand Final. The game was set-up by a fantastic century by Dave Measham then Uncle Gary and Dicko went through them to secure the flag.

1st XI

A great game was expected between two teams which had never won a Provincial Premiership - in fact this was the first time that Red Hill had made it to the Grand Final. It was a “Foreign Affair” type match with both teams having a substantial number of players who started their careers at other Clubs, for instance Long Island had the Bedford brothers (Karingal), Cuey (Mt Eliza), Johnno (Pines), Arnie and Dagga (Seaford) - we did however have 5 others who came through our junior ranks. Red Hill had Doc and Kev Ryan from Long Island, Andrew Brown from Mornington, Brad Piper & Martin Burns (YCW) and Dave Hunter (Baden Powell). Three of its other players, including former Australian Test player, Rodney Hogg, were recruited from areas other than the MPCA. Only two of their number were Red Hill products. Having said all that, it was an intriguing battle.

Red Hill batted first and it appeared that they were pre-occupied with batting their full complement of overs and our bowlers were able to rattle through the overs without any great additions to the score. Graham Vose batted beautifully for 64, being brilliantly (who would have thought that this adjective would be be used when describing a catch by Potto!) caught by Potto and it wasn’t until Kev Ryan and Hogg got together putting on 41 runs for the last wicket and at least giving the Hillmen a chance. With a day left to play we had lost 3/70 and the game was evenly poised, particularly with Hogg building up speed and bowling quite well. We lost a wicket early on the last day - 4/71 - and perhaps they moved into favouritism however Potto and Johnno were terrific and extremely brave against some hostile bowling and when Potto departed for 74 the game was almost ours. A fantastic effort to win our first Provincial Flag - perhaps the first of many?

Optus World Knockout Cup
No scores can be found for the Knockout Cup competition

In a Season in which we obtained the ultimate result there were a number of players who excelled -

Batting
Runs
597 Steve Meddings
539 Chris Burke
518 Rob Bedford
480 Steve Wisniewski
463 Paul Henderson
367 Stuart McLeod
325 Paul Hartle
324 Trevor Ryan
321 Peter Conell
317 Mark Sargant
315 Marty Kelly
307 Gary Measham
300 Greg Lamb

Centuries
Robert Bedford (2) 112no, 100
Damien Des Barres 137
Steve Wisniewski 117
Mark Sargant 111
Paul Hartle 106
Paul Henderson 105
Jeff Roach 103
Dave Wisniewski 100no

Bowling
Wickets
46 Paul Hartle
39 Stuart Swift
32 Peter Worland
31 Adrian Campbell
29 Kieran Worland & Cameron Bicknell
28 Michael Dixon
25 Gary Measham
23 Dave Simons
22 Brian McCue
20 Pat Van Raay & Greg Lamb

10 Wickets in a Match
10/51 Adrian Campbell
10/85 Michael Dixon

5 Wickets in an Innings
Dave Simons (3) 6/52, 5/38 & 5/89
Stuart Swift (3) 5/30, 5/77 & 5/78
Michael Dixon (3) 6/35, 5/34 & 5/49
Paul Hartle (3) 6/54, 5/37 & 5/40
Peter Worland (2) 5/29 & 5/60
Kieran Worland (2) 5/29 & 5/71
Adrian Campbell 7/32
Phil D’Agastino 7/51
Pat Van Raay 6/29
Nathan Ross 6/46
Cameron Bicknell 6/56
Gary Measham 6/61
Adrian Burton 5/29
David Smith 5/32
Malcolm Lilley 5/34
Dave Wisniewski 5/38
Marty Kelly 5/39
Chris Traynor 5/43
Brian McCue 5/75

Juniors
The Under 16’s were well to the fore in the MPCA this Season with David Disco Collins (371 runs), Josh Murphy (352 runs), Luke Van Raay (268 runs & 9 wickets), Leigh Batey (222 runs), Joel Stevenson (122 runs & 18 wickets), Mark Heller (18 wickets) and Peter Wilkinson (13 wickets) the major contributors in the East Grade while in the Central Division Adrian Campbell (122 runs & 14 wickets), Matt Longley (99 runs & 9 wickets), Stephen Clark (95 runs) and Chad Wilson (12 wickets) had good Seasons.

The Under 14’s had some excellent performers with the East Grade well represented by Sam Coates (349 runs), Michael Burke (317 runs & 19 wickets), Chris Hay (251 runs & 22 wickets), Marc Law (247 runs & 13 wickets), Lukas Murphy (141 runs) and Chris Buddha Hocking (15 wickets), and the Centrals’ Ricky Curtis (325 runs), Paul Billy Connolly (230 runs & 11 wickets), Lance Koch (176 runs), Luke Mirabella (157 runs), Ben Gook (17 wickets) and Luke Fenton (9 wickets) put in a good Season.

The Under 12’s had a number of lads who showed promise in this “learning grade” - Glenn Davey (147 runs), Damien Dunn (109 runs), Chris Barrett (100 runs), Rob Leary (75 runs), Archie Karunaratne (74 runs), Brett Wilson (161 runs & 11 wickets), Mark Sullivan (112 runs & 10 wickets), P.Johnson (102 runs & 9 wickets), Dean Pratt (91 runs), Jason Burgan (84 runs & 9 wickets), Justin Burgess (10 wickets), Michael Jones (9 wickets) and Brendan Spencer (10 wickets).