Captain of Cricket, Angus Reeves, reports on the season...

Captain of Cricket: Angus Reeves

Captain of the 1st XI: Angus Henry

The 1st XI

Club cricket:

A very wet summer affected much of our season's cricket. The 20/20 competition saw a couple of good wins against Old Boys and Fraser Tech but the team eventually finished third. Then it was on to the 50-over competition where 5 games were lost to rain. Nevertheless there were some good performances with the bat where both Angus Henry and Daniel Kibby scored a couple of 50s. The two-day competition saw a lot of tight cricket. An excellent win, defending 56, against Fraser Tech, meant we needed to win our final game to make the final. Unfortunately we fell just short against Old Boys and finished the competition in third place.

School cricket:

In Term 1 we first travelled to New Plymouth for our first exchange. This was a hard couple of days for the boys as we had two very close losses in tough playing conditions that led to New Plymouth Boys' High School getting the better of us. Next we hosted St Kentigern College for a two-day game. After an even contest, we were able to chase down the target with excellent batting in the final session. A 100 run partnership from Angus Henry and Snehith Devireddy formed the foundation before some good hitting from Bradley Rowell saw us get over the line. The Super 8 was initially rained out in Palmerston North and was played a month later with 6 teams. Despite not losing a game, we lost out on run-rate and finished third. Then it was on to the Northern Districts Gillette Qualifiers, held in Hamilton. We were well set in our opening game against St Paul's Collegiate but the rain had the final say. We then beat Aquinas convincingly, which helped our run rate. A victory over Mount Maunganui College meant we had made it to the finals. The boys were in good form and were excited to play St Peter's Cambridge in the final. After choosing to bat we lost 3 early wickets, however, a nice partnership by Eli Parker and Snehith Devireddy scoring 40 runs each helped us to get back in the game. Unfortunately for us, our bowling let us down and we fell at the final hurdle for the second consecutive year.

Senior Cricket

Our 2nd XI team had mixed results, but more importantly gave young players an opportunity to compete at a higher level. Congratulations to Reid Bishop on his 100. Many thanks to Craig Sulzberger for guiding our boys. For the first time in a number of years we entered two teams in the Hamilton Schools 1A league. Our Senior and Junior Development teams finished 4th and 5th respectively in this 10 team league.

Colts Cricket

This year we had three teams in the Colts League. Our Year 10 Gold Team narrowly missed out on the final on run rate. Congratulations to Harrison Clarke on winning the Best Bowler Award. The team also managed to perform well in the Northern Districts Junior Gillette Qualifiers and managed to make the finals, going down narrowly to Tauranga Boys' College. Thank you to Mr Thompson for his efforts and the team on making big strides this year. We also had a Year 9A Team for the first time. They performed well in the Colts League, finishing 4th. They also managed to win against Colts Teams from Kings and St Kentigern Colleges. Hopefully they can build on this and set the foundation for a future generation of HBHS cricketers.

Congratulations to Snehith Devireddy and Ewald Schreuder on their selection for the New Zealand Under 19 team that will play in the Under 19 World Cup in Sri Lanka. They, along with Angus Henry were members of the winning Northern Districts team at the Under 19 Provincial Championships.

We would like to say a big thank you to Mr Chris Kuggeleijn who has decided to step down from coaching the 1st XI team. His contribution to cricket at the school has been immense over the past 22 years. Fortunately he won’t be lost to cricket as he will focus on coaching our young players.

Thank you to all that have supported the game over the past year and wishing the teams all the best for the 23/24 season.

Angus Reeves