Cricket Southern Bayside: Port Melbourne awarded premiership six weeks after match

Cricket Southern Bayside has awarded Port Melbourne a premiership after finding its grand final opponent breached the rules.

Port Melbourne Cricket Club’s Masters team has been declared the premiership team - six weeks after losing the grand final.

Port was awarded the flag after Cricket Southern Bayside officials found Emmanuel South Oakleigh fielded an ineligible player.

The game was played on Sunday, March 28 and Port was bowled out for 85 as it chased 8-126.

But late last week Cricket Southern Bayside told Port Melbourne it had been given the premiership.

Port was alerted to a possible breach of the rules after the match when club president Chris Sewell was told a player coming off a long suspension had played in the grand final.

“I didn’t think much of it because we’d lost the game and, you know, bad luck,’’ Sewell said.

“But I thought about it a couple of weeks later and decided to have a look into it.’’

Port Melbourne president Chris Sewell.

Sewell presented photographic evidence to CSB, which investigated the issue and found that an Emmanuel South Oakleigh player had not played in matches in which he was listed in MyCricket.

Competition officials reversed the result.

It meant Port Melbourne had gone back-to-back in the Masters competition.

Sewell has played in a few premierships, but never one in such unusual circumstances.

“Bit of a hollow victory I suppose but premierships are hard to win so we’ll take it,’’ he said.

The team featured club great Robert Bevilacqua.

Meanwhile, Port Melbourne will find out on Monday night if it will be returning to the Victorian Sub-District Cricket Association.

The Subbies board is recommending that Port, Strathmore, Donvale and Spotswood join the association, increasing it to 32 clubs and creating four groups of eight.

Port Melbourne was one of the VSDCA’s foundation clubs in 1908 but a shortage of players forced it to drop out of the competition in 2002.

Last season its top team played in Division 2 of Cricket Southern Bayside.

Some Subbies observers have questioned Port’s ability to be competitive as it rises from the third grade of CSB.

But Sewell said the club was confident it could strengthen its squad once it got back into Subbies.

He said it was difficult to recruit players to Division 2 of CSB.

Subbies president Phil O’Meara is a former Port champion batsman and captain-coach, and is supporting the club’s return to the VSDCA.

“It was sad when they went in the first place, but the problem was, when Subbies went to four sides, Port Melbourne weren’t geared for four sides,’’ O’Meara said.

“They were OK with three, but not the four. It’s different now as far as numbers go. They’ve got juniors. They’ve got the foundations of success. What they need now is some quality players, but when you’re close to the city it’s easier to recruit. They’ve got those great facilities, and hopefully if they come in they can quickly make a good go of it.’’

The proposed expansion will go the vote on Monday night.

Port Melbourne won the VSDCA’s first senior premiership, defeating Malvern in 1908-09.

Its last senior pennant was in 1990-91, when it was champion of west group.