The final of the McCulloch Cup was held at Titwood on Sunday, 21st July, where McCrea FS West of Scotland’ secured a tense and exciting victory against Glasgow rivals Clydesdale. Both teams had battled hard to get to the final which was played in great spirit.
Winning the toss and electing to bat first West could find little impetus and posted 93 for 9 from their 20 overs. The Colgan brothers made the significant contributions of the innings with Joe scoring 23 and Tom 21. The Clydesdale bowlers were well on top and along with some excellent fielding looked to have restricted ‘West’ to an under par target. Top quality spin bowling accounted for 8 of the 9 wickets to fall with Daniel Cairns taking 4 for 20 in his 4 overs catching the eye. He was well supported by Zeeshan Bashir with 2 for 15 and Shahan Raja with 2 for 23.
As the Clydesdale reply got under way the vocal West support had become somewhat subdued but that did not last for long. Like West, Clydesdale never really had any momentum in their innings and wickets fell at regular intervals. Only Captain Paddy Barbour made anything of significance with a battling 27. 9 of the 11 Clydesdale batsman failed to get double figures which resulted in them falling 21 runs short of victory to disappoint the substantial home support.
The West attack, spurred on by the ever increasing noise from their support at the fall of every wicket, produced an all round bowling and fielding display of the highest quality to see the cup head to Partick. Tom Spensley with figures of 4 overs 1 maiden 4 for 7 was the stand out but in reality all the West bowlers performed well with captain James Fennah picking up 3 for 18 and John Oliver 2 for 19.
WDCU would like to thank the CSMOA umpires for the day Neil Cauldwell and Andrew Baird who officiated the game in fine fashion.
Finally thanks to Clydesdale CC for hosting the final in great style with the ground in top condition and arranging food and drink for all on a very fine day for cricket in the West!!