Casey-South Melbourne paceman Jayde Herrick celebrates with team-mates after taking the crucial wicket of Dandenong opener Brett Forsyth onBy Paul Pickering
WINLESS Casey-South Melbourne has all but ousted Dandenong from the Premier Cricket finals race.
The lowly Swans, who looked set to record the competition’s first winless season in 10 years, will require just 13 runs to secure first innings points this weekend after embarrassing the Panthers at Pultney Street on Saturday.
The visitors took full advantage of a lively pitch to dismiss Dandenong for just 130, before replying with 4/118 by stumps on day one.
The Panthers entered the final round needing at least six points to have any chance of vaulting into the top eight, but their task became difficult when Swans skipper Craig Entwistle sent them in on a juicy Shepley Oval deck.
Openers Brett Forsyth (29) and Tom Donnell (9) faced up to a seam assault from Jayde Herrick (4/49) and Ash Perera (1/34), who beat the bat consistently with some high-quality short-of-a-length bowling.
The Panthers pair needed all their patience – and a liberal dose of luck – to negotiate the early barrage, but Donnell’s fortune finally ran out when he edged an attempted leg glance to second slip off Perera in the 12th over.
Forsyth, who was targeted by some short stuff from Herrick, looked ready to launch a counter-attack before feathering one through to ex-Dandenong gloveman Tom Hussey just after drinks.
Dempsey (4) followed in Herrick’s next over, bowled between bat and pad as he attempted an expansive off drive.
Left-handers Matt Chasemore (17), James Nanopoulos (17) and Dave Newman (17) all wasted starts, leaving returning all-rounder James Pattinson (25) – playing as a batsman because of his back injury – to play a lone hand as the Dandenong tail faltered.
After the initial burst from Herrick and the unlucky Perera, Swans all-rounder Clive Rose (4/29) tormented the Panthers with his left-arm orthodox tweakers.
From 4/96, the Panthers slumped to be all out for 130 before tea.
In reply, Rose (42) and Entwistle (36) looked more assured on an improving wicket, combining for a 76-run opening stand that must have calmed the Swans dressing room.
Rose’s dismissal sparked a mini collapse, including two wickets from Brent Fairbanks (2/22), but even the fragile Swans line-up would be confident of finishing the job this Saturday.
Panthers coach Warren Ayres has not given up hope of a stunning turnaround, but said his charges were justifiably gutted by their performance.
“Our middle and bottom order just didn’t give us anything, and I think their bowlers probably had the height and the ability to hit the wicket harder and exploit the conditions better than ours,” Ayres reflected.
“I don’t think it’s lost yet though. They’ve got a record of turning winning games into losing ones, so hopefully that continues.”
Ayres knows that an unlikely reverse-outright result is Dandenong’s only hope of extending its season, but he blamed a slow start to the summer for the Panthers’ predicament.
“From game one onwards we were always chasing our tail,” he said.
“And maybe we can’t catch it this time.”
