Sale stifled by Aussie's blitz

11:56am Monday 28th April 2008

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Winnington Park 232-6

Sale 168-7DESPITE a good start against Winnington Park, Sale were eventually forced to hold on for a draw on Saturday.

They performed well enough for the first 40 overs, as they held the home side to 119-5.

Rick Halkon picked up two early wickets and J-P Lee and Jamie Broadbent were also successful in the early stages of their bowling spells.

But Park's new Australian batsman Sean O'Neill, unbeaten on 59 at that point, then decided that some momentum to the innings was needed.

He transformed Park's innings with an amazing and powerful blitz of the Sale bowling that took his own score to 145 over the next 10 overs, helping his side run up a phenomenal 105 runs in this period prior to the declaration.

In fact 72 runs came off the final five overs, including eight sixes mostly pulled to midwicket or square of the wicket.

O'Neill's final tally came from 114 balls and included 21 boundaries - 10 sixes and 11 fours. Two balls sailed out of the ground never to be seen again.

Rarely can a side have reached such a high score without getting full batting points but rarely can an innings have seen such an amazing transformation of run rate in the later stages.

After the shellshock of this performance, Sale made a muted reply and lost three early wickets in the first 12 overs.

Struggling to take the run-rate much over three, there was never much chance of reaching their target although John Taylor with 46 made a bold attempt to repeat the heroics of his fellow Aussie.

After his dismissal it was just a question of Sale scoring as many batting points as they could and they just reached a fourth point after 45 overs, thanks to battling performances by Rick Hampton (35) and Matt Millward (32 not out).

The match fizzled out to a draw with Sale on 168-7 at the close, the visitors picking up nine points to Park's 14.