Buckley Ridges great Shane D’Rozario and his son Jono star in Turf 3 premiership win

WOOKEY Medal champion Shane D’Rozario has left cricket on the high of sharing a vital partnership and playing in a premiership with his 14-year-old son Jono.

SHANE D’Rozario has had a fine career in the Dandenong District Cricket Association, featuring in a Turf 1 premiership with Buckley Ridges and winning the prestigious Wookey Medal in 2006-07.

But he bracketed playing in a Turf 3 flag with his 14-year-old son Jono on Sunday as “right up there with anything I’ve done in cricket, if not better’’.

D’Rozario’s voice filled with fatherly pride as he related Jono’s role in Buckley’s victory over Beaconsfield.

On day one the Bucks were 8-132, but father and son put on a match-turning 50 for the ninth wicket.

Shane hit 74 and Jono was 11 not out as Buckley Ridges raised 188.

That it dismissed Beacy for 168 was largely down to Jono, who nabbed 5-56 off 21 overs.

D’Rozario captained the team and after the match announced that, at 40, he was retiring.

Temamates Ben Edmondson and Mark Hick with Jono D’Rozario.

“I couldn’t think of a better way to go out after 33 years of playing cricket. Dream come true, really,’’ D’Rozario, of Lynbrook, said this afternoon.

“Just the way it all worked out … I was captain, Jono and I having a good partnership, him coming out and taking all those wickets when we had work to do on Sunday.

“As a father I was struggling for the right words, as my teammates could see …. you can imagine how good it was for me to bat with him and watch him bowl so well. It was outstanding.’’

It was Jono’s third premiership. He captained a Lynbrook Under 13 team to the flag and also played in a VMCU Under 12 Keith Mitchell Shield title with the Dandenong association.

Slow bowling runs in the family. Shane was an offie and his father, Eugene, also bowled leggies.

Jono represented the Southern Pioneers in the state Under 14 championships this year and took seven wickets from four matches.

Pioneers region manager Adrian Jones said he was a good prospect, with the ability to turn the ball and bowl with control.

“He’s always loved cricket … even when he was a toddler his mum was always telling him off for swinging a bat around the house,’’ Shane D’Rozario said.

Buckley Ridges stalwart Chris Rattle said D’Rozario had been a four-time club champion, a Turf 1 and four-time Twenty20 player, and a Wookey Medal winner, and had given the club outstanding service, particularly when it was struggling.

“He helped hold the club together,’’ he said.

Rattle said Buckley looked forward to Jono continuing the D’Rozario name at Park Oval.

Shane celebrated the Turf 3 premiership with a sip of his favourite drink, Scotch. His son and his matchwinning leggie had something softer.