ABERDEENSHIRE cruised into the second round of the Scottish Cup with an easy win over West of Scotland at Hamilton Crescent, writes William Dick.
Following the Highlanders Pro Series wins over the Reivers and a string of victories for east sides in the first batch of cup ties last week, the Eastern Premier champions continued that trend with a six-wicket triumph over their Western Union rivals.
Hopes of a home win were dashed early on when 15 year-old Dons bowler Connor Shorten picked-up two top order wickets. The Partick side never fully recovered from the blow, eventually crawling to 135-9. An opening stand of 114 between Chris Venske and Callum Martin then put the issue beyond doubt, Venske top-scoring with 79. Granite City neighbours Stoneywood-Dyce also proved too strong for Western Union opposition when they eased to victory by the same margin at Drumpellier. Ryan Williams and Jamie King had three wickets apiece as the Coatbridge team were skittled for just 85. Irvine gave Forfarshire a scare before going down by four wickets at Marress. Defending just 91, the Ayrshire side had their visitors struggling on 78-6 before Scott Cameron's 24 eased the jitters to see another Eastern Premier side safely through. However, Ferguslie rescued pride for the Western Union with a battling three-wicket win over Heriot's at Meikleriggs. And there was a further success for west clubs when Poloc secured an 81-run win over SMRH at Shawholm. The Glasgow side recovered from a shaky start to post 206-8 thanks to a brilliant 94no from South African Niel Bredenkamp. In reply SMRH lost wickets at regular intervals and were all out for 125. In an all-west affair East Kilbride completed a memorable weekend with a thumping win over Weirs at Albert Park to follow Saturday's Union success against Clydesdale. Harmanjit Singh top-scored with 85 of his side's 198-6 before the Weirs innings was reduced to tatters at 11-6. There was no way back for the first division side who eventually succumbed to a 121-run defeat, former Saltires star Ross Lyons claiming 4-19. Dumfries are also through after a five-wicket win over Strathmore Union outfit Meigle at Nunholm while Prestwick were too strong for Dundee HSFP.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article