Huge Win For Bulls

In what seemed a perfunctory effort to deny Western Australia a bonus point win after Queensland’s top order folded to 4-38 in reply to 321, the Bulls pulled off a famous final-over heist with a late-order charge orchestrated by Hugh Weibgen. 

Weibgen’s 115no (94) denied WA what had seemed a certain victory, dragging the Bulls back from the brink to win with just five balls remaining. 

In a week where Queensland’s dual football codes identify peaking at the right time as integral to on-field supremacy, Weibgen shifted through the gears to construct an innings before catching fire in the last 10 overs. 

It was his maiden List A century in what shapes to be a big summer for the emerging middle-order batsman. Combining with Weibgen, the mercurial Jack Wildermuth quashed anything overpitched and made serious in-roads into the deficit with a blazing 49-ball 74 including six maximums. 

To the parochial Brisbane crowd, 96 off the final 10 overs seemed a tall order when Wildermuth departed and Michael Neser joined the No. 6 batter n the middle. 

Enter Weibgen, who punctured onside gaps with surgical precision in a dominant cross-bat display. He was simply dismissive, swatting away a persistent short ball ploy by WA’s attack with the laconic insouciance of a vastly more experienced player. 

Neser’s vital cameo of 41 (23) eased some of the pressure but when Cameron Bancroft held on to a catch at deep mid-wicket, skirting the boundary like a tightrope, the Bulls were left needing 37 off the last six overs. 

Weibgen was unfazed, sealing the match off the first ball of the final over to take Queensland to a herculean win.

His unbeaten innings was also the highest score by a Queensland No.6 in List A Cricket, surpassing Craig Philipson's 100 against New South Wales in 2010, with Queensland recording its second highest run-chase to win a List A match.

Earlier, WA skipper Ashton Turner won the toss and chose to bat in the second day-night One Day Cup match of the domestic season, but it was Queensland that gained the ascendancy.

Michael Neser struck in the first over for the second time in as many matches this season, blasting off Sam Fanning’s front pad with a vicious in-swinger that evaded the young left-hander’s inside edge. The Bulls’ spearhead presented his trademark upright seam, troubling the left handers with prodigious movement off the surface.

However, using the same pitch that saw Tasmania post 381 on Friday, the Warriors’ top order batters were proactive early and reaped the rewards of a flat deck and some wayward work from Queensland’s new ball bowlers. Rookie opener Joel Curtis, with a List A average of 3.50 from 2 matches, pounced on any delivery that strayed onto the pads and slashed at the slightest hint of width.

The 25-year-old wicket keeper targeted Jack Wildermuth, taking him for 41 from his first five overs. He brought up his 55-ball half century with a quick single to backward point before launching a stunning back-foot assault that momentarily overwhelmed the Bulls.

The left-hander latched on to anything short, rocking onto the back foot and flaying Wildermuth square of the wicket. 

Leg-spinner Mitch Swepson was introduced in the 22nd over and was duly met with the full face of Curtis’ blade, lifting the leg spinner into the scaffolding at the Eddie Gilbert End to enter the nineties. 

Three overs later, Curtis brought up his maiden List A century off 95 balls with a cracking hook over deep mid-wicket, the signature of an impressive knock that may have surprised casual cricket observers but was long-awaited by an ardent Warriors’ camp.

His ability to take good length deliveries and pummel them over the square boundaries in one fluent swivel was the centrepiece of his century.

The experienced Sam Whiteman was crafty in support of Curtis, favouring sweeps and laps to counter a tight middle-over’s spell from Bulls’ spinners Mitch Swepson and Hugh Weibgen. 

Despite being struck a painful blow to the mid-riff off Neser, the veteran left-hander shared a 124-run partnership with Curtis, quietly compiling a run-a-ball 50 that crept up on the Sunday afternoon crowd gathered at Allan Border Field.

Queensland needed a moment of brilliance and Swepson delivered, taking a one-handed catch at mid-off to end the wicket-keeper’s knock on 116 (108).

Whiteman accelerated after Curtis’ departure, opening the face of his Grove bat to repeatedly exploit the gap between Jimmy Peirson and 3rd man. Swepson landed a crucial blow when Whiteman found Renshaw at deep midwicket to depart for a breezy 83 (83).

Cameos from Hilton Cartwright and Ashton Agar (who took 23 off Tom Straker’s last over) injected much-needed power in the dying stages with WA finishing 9-321.

Swepson was the pick of the bowlers for the Bulls, claiming a wicket in all three spells and two in the final over to finish with 4-52 while Straker took 3-65. 

Queensland’s pursuit initially failed to get going against a WA attack led by experienced campaigner, Joel Paris. The left armer drew first blood in the 5th over with Jack Clayton chipping to mid-on . Jimmy Peirson was Paris’ next victim, prodding and nicking a ball that held it’s line and drifted across the right-hander to leave the Bulls reeling at 2-25.

Bryce Jackson, who took 12 wickets in 4 ODM’s last season, had the white Kookaburra hooping under lights to compliment Paris’ disciplined start. 

With a languid run-up and a tall action, he struck Marnus Labuschagne on the pads twice and drew several false shots from the Bulls’ no. 3. Jackson got his man in the last over of the powerplay with Labuschagne slicing to Ashton Agar at backward point for 2 (19). 

Compared with Western Australia’s enterprising showing with the bat, Queensland’s top-order fell to an overly-tentative approach that stalled the innings inside the powerplay.

With the run rate required ballooning in excess of eight, Matt Renshaw failed to jam down on a surprise yorker that cannoned into his front toe from 200 cm quick Liam Haskett.

At 4-38, Weibgen joined Hearne in the middle with the job ahead of them, and the two Queensland Premier Cricket stalwarts settled to launch a counter-attack.

Hearne fell for 42 but the Warrior’s joy was short-lived as Queensland’s late order partnerships lifted the Bull’s from a stagnant mire to a victorious summit that was just a Weibgen hook away.