Belalie-Mokota hosted Rocky River at Booborowie on Sunday in an entertaining 50-over match that was switched from Spalding when that ground was declared unplayable due to an unplanned drenching.
There were seven changes to the published B M side including the omission of skipper Adam Willis.
And up against what proved to be a well-balanced Rockies combination the homeside was always destined to struggle.
Batting first Rocky River was far from comfortable in the early overs and at 2/57 with Craig Woolford (13) and Brett Ballantyne (28) both gone cheaply a couple of partnerships were required. Fortunately Michael Gaunt and Greg Baynes answered the call and when Baynes fell on 32 (caught Braedon Renshaw bowled Ron Shattock) the score had moved along nicely to 3/137.
Ben Pilkington joined Gaunt and they took it out to 4/186 when Pilko was caught behind by Matt Willis for 20 runs to give Zac Noonan his second wicket.
Noonan figured again two runs later when he held a fine catch off Renshaw’s bowling to dismiss Gaunt for a match-high 83.
Andrew Milne (3), Cameron Edson (0) and Scott Brand (14) saw the total pass 200 and it was all over at 8/217 with the not out batsmen being Brett Murdock (11) and Steve Merkel (1).
Noonan finished with an impressive 4/34/10, Renshaw 2/46/10 with singles to Geoff Thompson and Shattock.
Set 4.4 an over for victory B M fell well short to be all out for 131.
Sam Young was first to go caught Rick Willis bowled Edson for nine runs at 1/10 and Merkel bowled Robbie Sullivan (5) at 2/14.
Seven runs later Merkel bowled Matt Oppermann for a duck.
But Mick Cousins (17) and Tony Spackman (38) made runs to see the score teetering on 5/71 at the departure of Spackman, who was caught and bowled by Edson in a nice piece of work.
Thompson (17) was next to go at 6/100 when he mistimed a Milne delivery that crashed into his stumps and it was quickly 7/104 with Matt Willis (13) caught by his brother Rick off Edson’s bowling.
Brett Murdock was introduced to the attack and after cleaning up the tail with the wickets of James Lang (10), Noonan (2) and Shattock (0) he was nicknamed Sorbent.
Murdock’s figures were pretty good at 3/14 off 5.5 overs. Merkel took 3/30/7, Edson 3/57/10 and Milne 1/24/8.