Cheltenham Blue 15 vs Doncaster 15
Denise Healy reports
Feeling confident following a huge win last week, Chelt Blue should have started the game against Doncaster with conviction, especially as the opposition only had 8 players. For whatever reason, that confident play didn’t happen initially, despite good pitching from our starting pitcher, Barb. We were possibly a little shocked when this young team stepped up and belted the ball into the outfield one after the other. Our outfield probably hadn’t seen so much action for the whole season. It wasn’t as though we were missing the plays entirely, the opposition just found the gaps. So, by the end of the first innings we were down by seven runs.
Challenge was laid out…and accepted.
Slowly but surely we inched our way back into the game and after the 1st innings we were playing competitive baseball. It was difficult to shine in the batting box however, as the pitching was extremely erratic. This did play to our advantage as we received a lot of walks. During the wrap up of the game, coach Ant stated that one of the highlights from the game was in the fact that we were level headed in the batting box and didn’t swing at the crap pitches.
Highlights in the field included some great plays by Tara at shortstop throwing to 1st base – making it look all so simple. Michelle had an awesome game on 1st base and took some tricky pick ups.
Putting her body on the line this week was Pia at 2nd base. Having copped a bit of flack for a slip-and-slide show last week, Pia turned up with cleats! It didn’t keep her out of the dirt though. It wasn’t a case of slipping today, Pia showed awesome determination in not allowing the ground balls pass her. A good hit was heading past 2nd base but Pia threw herself at the ball and stopped it. Aware of the added pressure of a forced play of the runner heading to second, Pia didn’t waste time picking up the ball and standing up, in impressive commando-style, she heaved her body towards 2nd base and made sure the ball (and here entire body) was clearly on the bag. Importantly, she got the runner out! Showing what good sports they are, the Doncaster player jumped on Pia’s back and played a little “giddy-up” before heading off the field.
Top of the playlist this week, has to be a couple of amazing catches. Sue playing in centrefield copped a massive hit heading her way. No doubt Doncaster thought it was a safe bet, but they didn’t factor in Sue’s eye and she caught a fantastic catch. A little later in the game and Michelle equalled the impressiveness when a flyball was heading her way. It was a tricky one in the foul zone, but Michelle confidently had her eye on the ball, got a bit of air, and caught that ball!
Jess was close to having a similar catch on third base but it just slipped through the fingers! Not to be outdone though, Jess, chasing down an overthrow past third base, she had the sensibility to let the first runner go and focus on the next runner who was heading to 3rd, Jess threw beautifully to Tara covering third who tagged the player out.
The fact that the opposition was able to get so many hits away was testament to the great pitching by Barb and Sue. The umpire’s calls were a bit all over the place but that didn’t rattle our girls, they just pitched them in and got a lot of strikes.
Because we can’t possibly have a game without a little (lots) of laughs, Barb just happened to be the one to provide those laughs today. And, no, it wasn’t her Harry high-pants. Most of us were pretty much able to easily steal the bases throughout the game as they were not even attempting to pick us off. Things just weren’t going Barb’s way in the base running department today though. Just a little bit of a bummer to get out twice running from third to home! The first scenario came from a rundown. Now no-one wants to be in that position. Doncaster told us after the game that their girls were so excited to have had a rundown as they’d never had one, and they had just practiced it during the week at training… another bummer. Anyway, let’s just say Barb was not successful in her attempt to outplay the rundown.
Take 2… Barb’s on 3rd base and had a long lead towards home, the ball goes past the catcher and so Barb sensibly seizes the opportunity to head to home. Only problem was the slight hesitation… do I, don’t I?… she stops but decides to continue to run to home. Unfortunately that split second was the difference between safe and out.
So we had gradually clawed our way back into the game but time was not on our side. We had one last innings to bat and we were behind.
Whether it was miscalculation or miscommunication, fingers were pointed after the match…either way, it led to the grand announcement that if we got seven runs in the innings we would win!
OK, done, challenge accepted… let’s go get those seven runs.
You could almost feel the angels give us a big hug as calm descended and we went into our Zen moment…. Ever so calmly and silently, we went up to the batters box one by one. Facing a new pitcher, Denise was up first, a couple of pitches in and then bam, hits a firm ground ball between third and shortstop to make it safely to first base. Our next batter up …gets on base, next batter and the next batter. One by one, we got on base, stole the bases and importantly made our way past the home plate on every pitch the catcher missed.
We had none out and we were bloody excited when we’d got our seventh runner through.
Game called!!
The excitement was palpable. To come back from such a long way and steal a win at the death-nell was an amazing feeling.
HOWEVER….. Word soon spread that we hadn’t won, we had tied for a win.
To have our hopes dashed like that was devastating. But as we always do, we saw the positive in it all. It was just as well we thought we were in with a chance to win otherwise we may not have played so well in the end.
Well played ladies…. And thanks Ant for your patience.
