ORANGE stand-in skipper Richie Venner spoke about intent and playing aggressive cricket after his side capped its mostly lacklustre Western Zone Premier League season with a commanding seven-wicket thrashing of favourites Dubbo on Sunday.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
And the skipper led from the front in both cases.
Venner, 62 not out, smashed back-to-back-to-back sixes to finish off Dubbo in the final round of the representative season for Orange, the late flurry of maximums an entertaining footnote on an unbeaten 111-run fifth-wicket partnership with Dave Neil (66no) as the hosts passed Dubbo’s 174 in just the 30th over.
Having lost to Parkes and Cowra without the side’s batters making much of an impact, Venner said being dubbed competition easybeats wasn’t a tag that sat well with the playing group.
“Not at all,” Venner said.
“We need to inspire guys playing club cricket to want to come on and play for Orange to better themselves, which betters club cricket.
“That’s the brand and the style of cricket we need to start to play to make Orange a little bit of a force and not be the easy beats.”
Dubbo skipper Mitch Bower led an understrength side in Orange, but said the unavailability of a wealth of talent was due mainly to members of the team having family commitments more than taking their final round opposition lightly.
He said the players on show just didn’t perform.
“We didn’t think (174) would be enough, we knew it would be something to bowl at if we bowled well and got a few quick wickets,” he said.
“Not going on and getting the wickets through the middle killed us.
“They played well and we didn’t play well enough to win.”
Orange didn’t start its chase well, losing both Charlie Litchfield and Matt Baker to be 2-0, but Venner said the positive cricket applied by opening batsmen Mick Delaney (35), even in the face of losing early wickets, was instrumental in the victory.
“We’ve got to get back to playing Orange’s brand of cricket. Not someone else’s,” Venner said
“Really, most [club] teams [in Orange] here play fairly aggressive. We need to bring that into Orange cricket as well, not just think they’re a level above because this guy’s from another town or he plays zone. Let’s play the ball and bowl to the batsmen. It’s simple, getting back to basics.
“I’ll take a win against Dubbo any day regardless who they send down here.”
Earlier, Orange bowlers Daryl Kennewell (3-20), Hugh Le Lievre (3-60) and Venner (3-11) all took bags of three wickets to help remove Dubbo’s battling line-up, with the only form of resistance coming from former Orange City all-rounder Stu Naden (44).
