The Hills are Champions

With a very definite chill in the air there was a sense of ‘end of season’ as the last round of matches in the RSA Open Competitions D1 for 2013 were played out in the first weekend of September. Given the inclement conditions it was remarkable that three of the four matches got played, the encounter between Railway and Leinster being the only match to fall victim to the weather this season.

Going into the last round three teams were still in contention for the league but with The Hills very much in poll position and favourites to take the title. And so it proved. A comfortable win recorded in the end against a Phoenix side that fought hard to make a match of it. Neither the victory by Merrion [by eight wickets against North County] nor the loss by YMCA [by a DL 33 runs against Pembroke] changed the league placings and so The Hills are 2013 champions, with Merrion runners up.

The final league table will show that The Hills won 11 of their 14 matches with 257 points, a margin of 11 over Merrion.  As a team they scored 3,078 runs [31.41 per wicket] and conceded 2,746 [22.15]. It is interesting to compare this to their two closest rivals, Merrion and YMCA.

But as always statistics tell only half the story. The Hills won the league through their tenacity and strength of character that saw them through in tight situations. Over a six week mid season period they lost three games [the only three they lost in the league all year] and won three by margins of 1W, 2W and 2Ws, including a crucial win against Merrion. 

The Hills attained their league title through a strong team performance. Four players achieved over 400 runs [Mike Baumgart, Cormac McLaoughlin, Matt Sorensen and Nicolaas Pretorius] and five over 15 wickets [Sorensen, Nazeer Shoukat, Thomas Murphy, Luke Clinton and Mark Dwyer]. Ten of a squad of 19 reached double figures in the number of matches played.

This is the third time The Hills have been D1 League Champions, the last being in 2008 [when Merrion were also the runners up].