Ryan shines for South Coast cricket

The South Coast Women's cricket team have just returned from the Country Championships.

Lead by Carly Ryan the Women's South Coast Cricket team displayed enthusiasm both in batting and bowling.

With the depth of players in this team and players who could not attend due to injury or work commitments South Coast will continue to send competitive teams well into the future.

This year our Open team had four new players, who had played in the winning Youth team in 2006.

Although some of the players carried injuries into this carnival we were on par with all other zones, playing an extremely high level of cricket.

Playing on some well prepared wickets even the local wildlife came down to watch.

South Coast played North Coast in the first game losing 182 to 143.

Not knowing what the pitch had in store the bowlers were feeling their way.

The second game was against Newcastle with South Coast winning 109 to 108

This was a terrific effort as Newcastle went on to tie in the Final with ACT.

South Coast were really pumped up in this game and spearheading the bowling were Rachel Martin with an amazing 3/9 and Sheree Robertson with 3/28.

Carly Ryan scored 31 with the bat with Lucy Beattie 16, Sheree Robertson Not out 12 and Melissa Penman Not out 7 sealing the win.

The third game was not as successful against Riverina with South Coast going down 156 to 121.

Again Carly Ryan led the chase with 59 off the bat while Melissa Harrison chipped in with a valuable13.

Melissa Penman with 2/23 was again the pick of the bowlers with Renae Bennett the ever reliable keeper working hard.

Despite a good effort with the bat South Coast went down to the Central Coast in the next game of the series 140 to 139.

The last game of the weekend was against Western in the play off for 5th and 6th place.

South Coast batted first scoring 118 off the allotted 25 overs.

Despite some great effort on the field Western scored a single off the last ball of the day to take the game.