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Northern Districts, Wellington, and Otago have all won their matches in round two of the HBJ Shield.
Wellington Blaze vs Central Hinds
The Central Hinds had early success with the ball in Wellington, with White Fern Rosemary Mair causing the damage.
Mair struck on the second ball of the match to have Rebecca Burns and then grabbed Caitlin King the following ball. The Blaze had found themselves in trouble the day before to Ocean Bartlett, and today it would be Mair’s day.
Further success came for Mair; her third over of the day was getting Hannah Francis for six, and she also had former Hind Gemma Sims leg before the next ball.
With the home team in major trouble at 12/4, they would need a couple of players to stand up and put on a competitive score. That came from the bats of two fellow White Ferns, Jess Kerr and Leigh Kasperek.
The pair have often caused great damage with the ball to teams, but they both showed why they were batting four and six in the order with key contributions of 36 runs each.
Xara Jetly backed up her 28 from yesterday's game with 15 runs from the number seven position.
Bartlett managed to grab two wickets as the Hinds bowled the Blaze out for 132, with 13 runs coming from Rahcel Bryant at number eleven. Mair finished the day with six wickets for just 21 runs.
Central found themselves cruising along at 69/2 in the twentieth over, with Emma McLeod’s 41 at the top of the order playing critical in the solid start for the visitors.
Having lost Georgia Atkinson and Thamsyn Newton early on to Jetly, Central captain Mikaela Greig combined with McLeod in the middle.
The dismissal of the Hinds captain left her team in a real hole, with Kasperek, Francis, and Kerr taking to the batters as they went from 69/2 to 83/7 and then 99/9.
Still requiring 34 for the victory, there was going to be a need for a super batting performance from Bartlett and Aniela Apperley, but Francis managed to knock Apperley over three to take the win.
Francis finished with figures of 4/16, whilst Kasperek, Kerr, and Jetly all grabbed two each.
Northern Districts vs Auckland Hearts
Auckland were looking to follow up their victory over Northern Districts yesterday and was heading in the direction of doing just that before a last-wicket stand between Eve Wolland and Shriya Naidu got in their way.
Captain Maddy Green led the batting innings for her Auckland side with a superb 118*, scoring 60% of her side's 194 runs.
Wickets regularly fell throughout the innings for the visitors, with Marama Downes and Naidu picking up the two early wickets of Saachi Shahri (1) and Lauren Down (3).
White Fern Izzy Gaze and youngster Prue Catton could only contribute five each, whilst Bella Armstrong’s 15 provided support to Green in a fifth-wicket stand worth 38 runs.
Green continued working alongside her side to make small but meaningful partnerships, with the Hearts all out in the 47th over.
Naidu finished with three wickets to her name, whilst Downes and Jess Watkin grabbed two each for Northern in a quality bowling performance.
The chase of 199 for victory by Northern was led by Wolland’s 48, Watkin’s 35, and Yaz Kareem’s 33.
Auckland found themselves with early success as Molly Penfold had opener Tash Wakelin for a duck, and then they managed a runout of Caitlin Gurrey for 12 following a mixup with Kareem.
Nensi Patel, in her 150th match for Northern, only managed 8, whilst Watkin’s quick 35 from 29 accelerated the Northern runout, but when Watkin departed to Fran Jonas, it brought some trouble for her side.
They quickly went from 86/2 to 111/7 by the time Annie Ewart fell, with Kareem falling victim to Amie Hucker, therefore losing the set batters.
18-year-old Wolland worked alongside Jesse Prasad (8) and Downes (21) to leave Northern needing 29 with two wickets remaining.
Skye Bowden, who had come in as a concussion substitute for Bernadine Bezuidenhout, could only muster one and left Northern with 26 runs needed between the final pair.
Wolland stepped up, and with Naidu’s 4* from 28 balls, they saw their side home to a one-wicket win. Penfold finished the day with three wickets, while Hucker and Jonas both had two.
Canterbury Magicians vs Otago Sparks
Otago once again were led by a strong effort by their bowlers in a 114-run victory over the Magicians in Rangiora.
Electing to bat first, Otago did lose Saffron Wilson (4) and Bella James (36) inside the powerplay but were going along at a steady rate of five runs an over.
An injury to White Ferns pacer Lea Tahuhu in the third over didn’t help Canterbury’s case either.
Caitlin Blakely and Felicity Robertson led the innings with the bat for the Sparks with 42 and 43 to their names, respectively, whilst some lower-order knocks also contributed.
Hayley Jensen struck 38* from 42, and alongside Anna Browning’s 32 and Olivia Gain’s 27, they got the Sparks through to 247 from their 50 overs.
Wickets were shared among the Canterbury bowlers, with two wickets to Frankie Mackay and Sarah Asmussen.
The chase started well for Canterbury as they saw their way through the powerplay without loss, but the fall of Kate Ebrahim to Eden Carson brought about a flurry of wickets for the Sparks.
Kate Anderson (1), Nat Cox (4), and Missy Banks (6) could only put on single-digit scores, whilst Izzy Sharp’s 11 provided a bit of a holdup for the Sparks, but Carson, too, grabbed her.
There was some resistance shown by captain Laura Hughes and Jess Simmons as they put on 47 runs, but the game was soon over after Simmons and Hughes fell within four runs of each other.
The Sparks managed to grab the victory off the back of Anna Browning’s career-best List A figures of 3/34, and Carson chipped in with 3/23.
Jensen had two wickets to her name, whilst Louisa Kotkamp bowled tight to finish with 1/9 from the four overs she bowled.
Otago’s win means they sit atop the HBJ Shield table with 10 points, and Central are in second on five. Auckland, Northern, and Wellington all sit next on four points each, and Canterbury is yet to get on the board following the two losses to Otago.
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