By Nick Creely
Dandenong medium pacer Peter Cassidy almost gave Premier cricket away four years ago.
Now he will enter the 2017/18 Victorian Premier Cricket final series as one of the Panthers’ most prized assets.
Known around Premier circles as a bowler who rarely strays off a good line, Cassidy has had a good old fashioned break out season after showing signs in his first couple of years at the club, taking 29 wickets to date at an average of under 15 and a phenomenal economy of 2.7, but the numbers don’t quite do justice in terms of his importance to the side.
The Washington Park and Carnegie junior left rival club Prahran after the 2014/15 season after being unable to break into the first XI, but as he explains, almost didn’t.
“I was about to give cricket away, I genuinely had enough; I got to the age of 18 and 19, and had enough and was going to play with my mates at Brighton, and Charith Cooray, who played a few ones games, I’m best mates with his younger brother, and he came to me and asked me if I was interested in coming to Dandy, and I went and had another crack at it,” he said.
It’s certainly worked out perfectly for Cassidy and the Panthers, with the culture and its hunger for success a major drawing factor.
“It’s good playing in a successful club with a good bunch of guys, it’s easier to do well, and I’ve fed off the likes of Nano (James Nanopoulos) and Jacquesy (Jacques Augustin) this year, and I’ve loved playing with them, it’s been good,” he said.
“I’ve worked with Nano a lot; Speaky’s (Nick Speak) also been massive, and really pushed me, but one of the biggest things for me was having Steve Mullaney over for those four games, the way he went about it was unreal. Seeing how he bowled, and him teaching me certain things was awesome.”
While he concedes express pace isn’t his go; and never will be; Cassidy prides himself on playing a match winning role in another area.
Cassidy took 6/30 from 18 brilliant overs only a few weeks ago, in a match winning effort against Northcote.
“The biggest thing for me is when the game gets out of control, I can get the control back, even if that’s not taking wickets, more just dotting them up and drying out the game, that’s something we’ve worked hard on and when we need to dry up we do, and when we need to go, we go,” he said.
Cassidy believes last year’s untimely semi-final loss to Melbourne after finish second on the ladder was the wake-up call the club needed, and one that is driving the high standards at Shepley Oval.
“That hurt last year; we’re really keen to make amends as a club, and hopefully go one better this year for sure,” he said.
“We’re probably hungrier (this year); we’re extremely disappointed with how we exited last year, and obviously having Darren (Pattinson) back is massive, and just having him back around the group has helped; we’ve just got this hunger to win, and the one-day final was a great taste of what we want, which is a two-day flag.”
That one-day final he speaks of, the extraordinary rout of Carlton back on 21 January; where the Panthers rolled the Blues for 49 and Cassidy took 2/12; is a feeling that Cassidy hopes to emulate, and one that won’t leave anytime soon.
“That was one of the best days I’ve ever had; it was really worth it, and we couldn’t have scripted it any better, we worked really hard coming into that game, and everything clicked for us, to be honest,” he said.
“Our batsmen have really held us together, and everything kind of just clicked at the one time, so it was just so good.”
