The ability to keep their composure under pressure has seen a young St George side score a heart-stopping six-run win over Randwick Petersham.
The victory sees Saints advance to the Twenty 20 Cup preliminary final against local rivals Sutherland at the Sydney Cricket Ground on Sunday.
At Hurstville Oval on Sunday, Randwick captain Anthony Sams won the toss and sent the hosts in, opting to hold back former Australia batsman David Warner for a run chase later in the afternoon.
Tom Engelbrecht starred with the bat for St George top-scoring with 48 before he was run out.
Saints scrapped their way to 7-139 at the end of their 20 overs, a total St George captain Nick Stapleton said was always going to be tough to defend given Hurstville’s short boundaries and the quality of the opposition.
But defend it they did.
Warner made 62 from 60 balls as his teammates attempted to bat around him. But St George’s attack of Luke Bartier (4-26) and Tom Ortiz (3-14) did enough to restrict Randwick with a consistent fall of wickets.
When Ortiz eventually had Warner dismissed with an outstanding catch from Andrew Walsh at long off it left Randwick in trouble at 6-124.
And St George would hold on, restricting Randwick to 8-133 at the end of their 20 overs.
It was a coming-of-age performance from the young St George side. Only in round one in a 50-overs match had Saints failed to handle Warner and Randwick when they had Test quick Josh Hazlewood and NSW Sheffield Shield paceman Trent Copeland in their attack.
This time, St George’s young stars got the job done themselves.
“To be honest it was just a really good team performance,” Stapleton said.
“I thought we were probably about 20 runs short of where we wanted to be with the bat. But we spoke about how Randwick bowled and their length and how hard it was to score when they got it right.
“We knew if we fielded well and took our opportunities, bowled to our plans it’d keep us in the game.
“In a couple of moments when they looked like they’d get on top of things we took wickets to slow them down and held our nerve towards the end.
“At the time I don’t think you could be confident that any score was going to be enough given their line-up to be completely honest. But we’d shown previously, especially in the round game against Sutherland, that if we stuck to our plans I definitely thought we were a chance.
“They are such a dangerous side, sometimes plans just don’t come off. But we didn’t panic. Whenever we bowled a bad ball we went back to our plans quickly.”
Stapleton paid tribute to his bowlers who stuck to their plans against Warner and were eventually rewarded.
“Our plan was to bowl quite full and wide at him if he got in. But we also thought if we could get wickets to fall consistently then he’d have to bat most of the innings. He played a really good knock and kept them in the game right to the end,” he said.
“We were fortunate in that we kept executing our plans and didn’t give him any easy balls to hit.
“Hurstville has short boundaries and that shows how good our bowlers’ lengths were. When we got him in the second last over it just lifted us and gave us the kick we needed.”
Stapleton also praised his young side as a collective, who are now just two wins away from helping St George lift their first piece of silverware since 2014.
“It was massive. We’re a very young side. We do play a lot on confidence. It was huge. It shows what we can do when we put our mind to things and concentrate,” he said.
“We fought for everything in the field. We were like a pack of dogs fighting over a bone.
“I feel like we’re going well in white ball cricket at the moment. I’d like to see us take that into our two-day cricket but I guess that will come with experience.
“Coming in we knew what we needed to do, rely on and know our strengths.”
If Saints defeat Sutherland in their preliminary final on Sunday morning, they would advance to the final against either Penrith or Sydney University on Sunday night.
