The Cricket Management Committee members are compiling league reports for the season. Here is the first of them from Greenock CC’s Peter Hempsey.
Congratulations to Ferguslie CC, Premier Division Champions 2018. In what was one of the very best summers for cricket in the west of Scotland for decades, Ferguslie CC were deserved winners. Thirteen wins from fourteen matches completed and an 94.29% total gave the Paisley side a massive 20% winning margin from runners-up Clydesdale CC who gained ten wins from fifteen matches played. Ferguslie’s only loss was against Greenock CC at Meikleriggs in early June.
At the opposite end of the table, there was a tremendous battle fought out by Greenock CC, Ayr CC and Dumfries CC which went right to the last week of the competition and resulted in Ayr and Dumfries occupying the bottom two league positions.
During the season there were numerous very fine individual performances. Champions Ferguslie had the Premier Division’s top run scorer in Michael English who racked up a massive 718 runs, which included two centuries, with team-mates Elliot Moses (544) and Gregor Preston-Jones (477) also in the league’s top ten run scorers. For the second year running, Richie Berrington (Clydesdale) was the second highest run-scorer with 625 runs.
Poloc CC’s South African pro’ Jurie Snyman had the highest two innings of the season with a remarkable 209 against Greenock and 148 not out against Stirling County CC. And in a season where there were twenty individual scores of 100 or more, Richie Berrington (Clydesdale), Jimmy Sholto-Douglas (Overseas Amateur, Uddingston CC), Anwar Hafeez (Ayr) and Coenraad Nel (Overseas Amateur, Poloc) each recorded two centuries in the Premier Division.
Champions Ferguslie had three of their bowlers in the top ten wicket-takers for the season with Hamza Tahir (25), Haroon Tahir (23) and Jamie Carruthers (22). But the top wicket-taker in the Premier Division for season 2018 was Neil Flack (Greenock) with 32 wickets. Runner-up was Ross Lyons (Uddingston) with 28 wickets, while last year’s top wicket-taker Sachin Chaudhary (Prestwick CC) was third with 26 wickets.
On the very last day of the season Alan Davidson (Dumfries CC) returned the most outstanding bowling figures of the 2018 season with eight wickets for just 19 runs from eight overs against Ayr at Nunholm. Ross Lyons (Uddingston) and Rukman Hewage (Stirling County) each returned the excellent figures of 6 for 21 during the season, while Riyaad Henry (Ferguslie), Sachin Chaudhary (Prestwick) and Neil Flack (Greenock) each gained a five-wicket haul in a match.
Finally and definitely worth mentioning was the rare feat achieved by Stirling and Dumfries as they tied both matches in 2018!!