Southern Districts aims for its first Premier Grade cricket pennant in next week’s grand final

SOUTHERN Districts and Darwin will meet in a Darwin and Districts cricket grand final for the first time after comprehensive semi-final wins.

Harry Chamberlain in the colours of the Desert Blaze. He has been the form batsman of the competition in the last fortnight. Picture: GLENN CAMPBELL

SOUTHERN Districts and Darwin will meet in a Darwin and Districts cricket grand final for the first time after comprehensive semi-final wins.

The September 21-22 decider is Districts’ first trip to a grand final since 2007 and third attempt to win an elusive Premier Grade flag.

Darwin is chasing its 10th senior flag in what will be the club’s 17th grand final since 1985.

Minor premier Districts beat Nightcliff by 156 runs at Fred’s Pass, bowling the Tigers out for 192 in their pursuit of 349 runs to win the game.

Adi Dave (43) and Sanka Wijegunarathne (38) took the score to 1/112 before the spin of Dean Fry (5/38) and Matt Hammond (3/33) took maximum effect.

The match had its tense moments at the first drinks break when angry words were exchanged between both sets of players, the timely intervention of both umpires preventing what could have been a difficult situation.

Districts captain Graeme Beghin pointed to the introduction of spin pairing Fry and Hammond as the turning point in the match.

“With the faster bowlers on early we decided to attack and they showed a lot of aggression by hitting a lot of boundaries,’’ Beghin said.

“But when Dean came on he bowled beautifully for his five wickets and changed the game, but Nightcliff’s young side had a lot to take away from this game.’’

Nightcliff’s Udara Weerasinghe was proud of his young charges despite the big margin.

“We played six juniors and a 100 per cent local side, so the future of Nightcliff Cricket Club is definitely in good hands,’’ he told the NT News.

Darwin’s five-wicket win over PINT completed a rags to riches story for the Eagles, who were last on the table and seemingly out of contention for September only a month ago.

New skipper Harry Chamberlain completed captain’s weekend with a blazing 122 from 132 balls to steer the Eagles past their run target with five wickets in hand.

It was not all plain sailing for Darwin, who slumped to 3/5 before Chamberlain and Cameron Fatchen (51) put on a matchwinning 142-run stand for the fourth wicket.

New Zealander Chamberlain grinned when reminded he had made 316 runs in last two trips to the centre wicket at Marrara.

“It has been good, I got some starts early in the season and only in the last couple of months have I been able to convert them into big scores,’’ he said.

“The boys are excited about what we’ve achieved, we’ll celebrate this win and start to focus on the grand final from next week.’’