Division 4 - 2011 Season Review

Although Division 7 has been labelled as the closest league, it was only the middle portion of the league that was close, with Merrion 5 winning at a canter. Division 4 was a whole different kettle of fish, with even Mullingar in sixth spot being able to make a convincing case that it should have been them lifiting the trophy at the LCU dinner on November 11th. Here is a brief summary of the top six team's season

Mullingar - On June 25th, the midlanders were still in contention having only lost once to YMCA, and chalking up four victories. After that however, all the chalk was doing was grating on the blackboard, and only two more victories came. 55 points off top spot

North Kildare - Whether the whole club went on holiday for July is not known, but in this month, four games were lost. Before July they won three matches from five, and after July they won four from five. 59 more points would have taken top spot (they played more matches than Mullingar, and hence needed more points), and they must look at July and think if only.

Phoenix - Must be kicking themselves, as the league really was there to be won. 21 extra points would have put Phoenix in first place, and they did the hard work by beating YMCA twice (who finished 2nd) and Merrion once (who finished top). However on July 16th they lost to Malahide, giving the Villagers their only victory of the season. They also had a rained off match against 7th place Laois, and a loss to 6th place North Kildare. Victory in any of those matches would probably have been enough to win the league

Railway Union - Fifteen points short of the Division 4 trophy. Railway had the finishing line in sight, but in the style of Dorando Peitri stuttered, stumbled and failed to take gold. They won their first seven matches, not losing until August 14th, but then hit the wall. In fairness, they were left with a very tough run in, needing to beat two of Malahide, Merrion and YMCA twice. They managed the Malahide victory, but fell one match short

YMCA - YM were happy enough to get promotion, but a further 13 points would have been enough to overhaul Merrion. YM had a disjointed season, never winning or losing more than three in a row, but crucially did the double over Railway Union, ,and beat Merrion once as well. Losses to Laois, North Kildare and two to Phoenix didn't come back to haunt them

Merrion - Similarly to YMCA, Merrion had something of an up and down season, but won the matches that mattered including the vital last match against YMCA. The end of the season ended in some controversy when Laois were unable to send a team to Merrion. If the match had been played, Merrion would have needed a win or a tie to have still been promoted. Although this is likely, as Laois would by definition have sent an extremely poor team, it left a few question marks on the division.

On the individual front, Division 4 was a league of many runs. and many wickets as well. The batting was dominated by players who didn't finish in the top three places (perhaps not surprising in such a tight league). Rashad Ejaz finished well clear, with 616 runs at 61.6 for Mullingar. Ejaz was only of only three players in the entire open competitions who scored three centuries, Andre Botha (Terenure) and Neil Brown (Merrion) were the other two. Remarkably, Ejaz scored consecutive ducks in June/July.

Masood Ahmed had an equally convincing 581 runs at 58.1, with three North Kildare players, Ian Walsh, Robert Neavyn and Manjeet Singh following. Neil Brown lifted the Bookman Cup for best batsman in Division 3/4. He only batted 8 times in Division 4 though ,scoring 336 runs at 67.2.

In all there were 14 hundreds scored, so I won't add the details - congrats to Ejaz, Brown, Masood Ahmed, Shammi Ahmed (YMCA), Paddy Collins (RU), Travis Partidge (YMCA), Adam Shehabeddin (Mal), Neavyn, Walsh and Amit Battan (Pho)

On the bowling front, there was one man, head shoulders, a step ladder and a box ahead of the others. Yaqoob Ali took 36 wickets at 10.31, a huge part of YMCA's promotion success. He also won the Oulton cup for his troubles.

With Rex Walsh coming second in the Division 5 averages, Alex O'Brien proved that Merrion's spin cupboard continues to be well stocked, with 24 wickets at 16. The top three is completed by Masood Ahmed, completing a fine allround season, with 22 wickets at 18.

No bowler in Division took six wickets, no bowler took seven wickets. But one took eight wickets, the aforementioned Yaqoob Ali, who took 8-16 for YM against Malahide on July 10th