St Kevin’s 1st XI Trip 2025

North West 1st XI Pre Season Trip

Over the weekend a squad of 13 members from the North West 1st and 2nd Xi squads travelled down to Omaru to take part in three fixtures over two days against Waitaki Boys High School and St Kevins College. Leaving from the Burnside Park Clubrooms, we travelled down Thursday morning, leaving the glorious Christchurch sunshine and as we got further south, the darker the weather got.

As soon as we hit the Oamaru boundary, the rain came thundering down and there were the immediate bleak thoughts running through the minds. However it stopped as quickly as it started, and after settling in at the St Kevins School hostel and taking a few minutes just to get squared away, we headed down to have a net session while the sun beat down overhead.

That was a great chance for the boys to stretch the limbs and make final preparations for the games tomorrow.

From there, the majority headed into town to use the pool, before coming back to the hostel to take advantage of the fact we were all together to discuss and make plans for the games ahead.

Sunshine greeted us on Friday morning, while thunderstorms were forecast for the entire afternoon and with two T20’s scheduled against Waitaki Boys, we weren’t optimistic we would get both games in.

Sporting the new strip for the first time, Jordan won the toss in the morning game and chose to bat first as we looked to set a total, and at the same time we confirmed that for the second game in the afternoon, we would bowl first, in order to get a taste of both setting and chasing a total.

Jasper opened the batting with Olly for the first game and put us on top early, running hard and finding the gaps through the field, runs coming from nearly every ball early on. An early setback saw Olly dismissed when his attempted scoop clipped his shoulder and was well caught by a diving slip.

Jordan joined Jasper and both of them found it easy going as they picked up boundaries with struggle. Jasper doing so with deft touches and finding gaps, while Jordan went over the infield. He hit 3 huge sixes, clearing the 50m boundary with ease every time, and when he fell trying to go once more, they had put on 63 in just 6 overs.

Sam Waddell, given the chance to bat at 4, looked in sublime touch when he hit his second ball over mid off for 4 and Jasper brought up a wonderful half century with him at the other end. The runs kept coming, both batsmen clearing the fence, Jasper flicking one fine for 6, while Sam kept hitting straight.

The pair of them put on 93 off 54 balls before Jasper fell for a brilliant 89 off 60 balls, trying to clear the boundary. He hit 14 fours and 1 six in the innings that had set us up. There were only a couple overs left at this point and it was all guns blazing. Rory fell trying to do so, but Sam and Will both cleared the rope and when 20 overs game to an end, we had posted a mammoth 193-4 with Sam notching 43 off 29 with 3 sixes as we set ourselves up really well.

We knew they would come hard at us in order to stay in the game and a remarkable start greeted us as the first 8 balls of the innings were all fielded by Jasper at mid off. We rang the changes, going through 2-3 over spells for a number of bowlers and were well on top early without picking up wickets.

Runs weren’t flowing, but we didn’t make any breakthroughs until the 7th, where Rory came in and nicked off their opener. We would only take two more wickets throughout the first match, both of which came in the same over by Yatharth, both also caught by Alex at cover.

Despite not taking any more wickets, we were very good with the ball in hand, bowling to our plans, limiting the bad balls and cutting off a number of runs in the field. We bowled through the 20 overs with Waitaki Boys finishing up at 136-3.

A 57 run win in our hands and we were pretty happy to start.

The rain had so far stayed away, and we were pretty keen to start the second game as soon as possible to get through it and we found ourselves back out in the park with a new ball in hand.

Changing things up, we had a new opening bowler pair, and the rest of the order had also changed. It couldn’t have started any worse for us as 2 sixes were clubbed in the first over and after 2 overs, Waitaki were sitting at 27-0.

To our credit, we bounced back really well. Dilan grabbed our first wicket, caught at second slip before Jasper nabbed a second and we started to apply the brakes as we rung the changes once more. In both games we used 10 bowlers, and it was the part timers doing the damage with the ball.

Rory grabbed two more wickets in this game, leaving him as the leading wicket taker after the T20’s. George and Jasper also grabbed 2 each, while Alex, Aroon, and Will got 1 for themselves as we bowled Waitaki Boys out for 128 after 20 overs.

Again, like with the bowling, we changed up our batting order with Will and Rory opening up together and quickly put together a strong start. However, just into the 2nd over, rain started to fall and dark clouds hung overhead with the wind picking up.

By the end of the 4th over, we had put on 43-0, but the rain had evolved into hail and thunder was booming overhead. As players and fans alike made a dash for the pavilion, it was looking like that would be the end of the game, but with both batsmen looking good on 17*, it would have been a shame to finish up now.

To their credit as well, Waitaki were super keen to play cricket, and it was them urging us back on as the sun came back out quickly and dried the ground.

Yet not an over of play later, the weather turned again, and a bitter gale blew across the ground as the boys on the sideline went searching for anything they could to stay warm, while we suffered a mini collapse in the middle, falling from 49-0 to 65-3.

Jordan settled any potential nerves within his first 7 balls as he blasted 3 sixes out of the park and Liam at the other end was finding the boundary too. They brought up a 50 run partnership off just 22 balls before both of them were out swinging for the hills as the hail returned.

Unfortunately, the second hailstorm was very heavy with big hailstones that were causing some pain to those struck by them and though there was no rain, they covered too much of the ground and there was little to no chance of them clearing or drying that late into the afternoon and the game was abandoned, but after some quick calculations, it would have counted as 36 run win on Duckworth Lewis for North West.

Another great performance which had so many players step up and make a score or take a wicket. Will scored 30, Jordan 32 off 12, Rory 22 and Liam 20 as we put in back to back great batting efforts. After those two games the boys headed back to the hostel to dry off and warm up, before enjoying some well deserved downtime as we moved into our last day of the tour

Saturday saw us scheduled to play St Kevins in a 40 over fixture and again Jordan won the toss and elected to bat first, With Jasper and Olly opening together once more. It was a slow start as we hit fielders a lot, but still built at 4 rpo early on and suddenly, out of nowhere, Jasper flicked a full toss over square leg for 6 and he was away.

92 minutes after the start of the innings, Olly walked off the field to rapturous applause as he celebrated a brilliant 50, hitting a 6 down the ground off the spinner to go from 49 to 55, before retiring Not Out after an innings of 59 balls.

9 minutes later and it was Jaspers turn to retire after celebrating a milestone, but his was one higher. Jasper piled on the runs for the second straight innings, scoring 104* off 90 balls before he too retired Not Out, his 4th century for North West.

He and Olly put on a whopping 173 run opening partnership off just 24 overs. Olly hitting 4 fours and 1 six, while Jasper hit 12 fours and 2 sixes as he brought up his hundred with a pull for 4 down to fine leg, moving from 99 to103.

The first wicket fell on 200 as Jordan hit 10 off 6 balls, hitting his second ball for 6 after hitting a 6 first ball yesterday. Zac looked good early, until he sent himself for an early shower, trying for a suicidal single, but Will Rory and George all chipped in with starts, the later hitting a massive 6 over mid wicket off their opening bowler, while Sam was once more outstanding as he thumped 37 off 23 and we finished on a mammoth 297-7 from our 40 overs.

Alex and Dilan got us off to a decent start with the ball, though a fair amount of swing caused for a number of wide’s, they both hit the stumps, but again through the middle it was Rory who played a starring role with the ball. 9 bowlers used and 7 different wicket takers, it was Rory who took 4-21 to tear St Kevins middle order open.

Chasing near 300 was always going to be tough, and Aroon kept it tight early which put pressure on them and the other bowlers reaped rewards.

Jasper collected 4 catches and a wicket to go with his ton, while Alex and George grabbed a couple of wickets each. We finished the innings being thoroughly dominant, both with the ball and in the field, having taken 13 wickets and if it wasn’t for the last couple of overs where we took a little bit of tap, the margin of victory would have been more as St Kevins posted 170.

All in all, it was a fantastic couple of days away and we are so grateful and lucky that we were able to get this trip put together.

A huge thank you to St Kevins and Waitaki for hosting and taking part in these games and a huge congratulations to all the boys involved and to all those who helped make sure this was able to go ahead

Attached are full scorecards of the 3 games played

Game 1

North West 193-4

Jasper 89 (60)

Waitaki Boys 136-3

Yatharth 2-14

North West Win by 57 Runs

Game 2

Waitaki Boys 128-10

Jasper 2-8

Rory 2-11

George 2-16

North West 121-7 (13.4ov)

Jordan 32 (12)

Will 30 (31)

North West win by 36 runs (DLS)

Game 3

North West 297-7

Jasper 104* (90)

Olly 55* (59)

Sam 37 (23)

St Kevins 170-13

Rory 4-21

North West win by 127 runs