Heaton bring home the shield!

Heaton Girls’ Cricket team National Cricket Champions!

Our Heaton Girls’ First XI qualified again for the ANZ Junior Shield tournament in Palmerston North seeing off skilled competitive cricketers in their lead up matches.

Heaton made a brilliant start to the tournament winning their first game against Remuera by 113 runs. Rounds 2 and 3 matches were comfortable wins against Tawa Intermediate by 100 runs and Balmacewen Intermediate by 4 wickets.

The third day’s games were to be the toughest with Tauranga Intermediate and St Matthews wanting to snare a win from the in-form Heaton team.

Heaton batted first against a spirited Tauranga Intermediate Team and lost early wickets. Tauranga bowled and fielded very well and runs were hard to find until Lily came to the crease and worked hard for her 55 runs off 49 balls which was the backbone of Heaton’s 119 runs. Taking the field our bowlers were superb bowling straight and on the money! Opening bowlers all took 2 wickets each, Ava - 2 wickets for 5 runs off 4 overs (with a maiden over), Claira - 2 wickets for 11 runs off 4 overs and Lily - 2 wickets for 5 runs off 3 overs. Heaton won the game by 74 runs.

In the afternoon Heaton batted first against an energised St Matthews team. Their fielding and bowling contained our batters and we were feeling the pressure. Heaton scored a respectable 90 runs, our lowest for the tournament. St Matthews got their innings off to a powerful start with their captain scoring a quick-fire 44 off 31 balls until Lily bowled a beauty and she was given out lbw. Our bowlers put the rest of their batters under pressure and St Matthews were all out for 63. Ava’s bowling figures were impressive with 3 wickets for 16 runs after 4 overs as were Lily’s with 2 wickets for 12 runs off 3 overs. Heaton won by 27 runs.

Congratulations to our girls for their fantastic efforts throughout the season to be National titleholders. Sincere thanks to coach Barry van Beurten for his time, energy and dedication, throughout the year. Special mention should be made of Lily who was Heaton Intermediate’s MVP of the tournament.