Pura Cup: New South Wales v Tasmania at Sydney, 17-20 Oct 2001 CricInfo Live Report

Pura Cup: New South Wales v Tasmania at Sydney, 17-20 Oct 2001
John Polack

Tasmania 2nd innings: Stumps - Day 3,
New South Wales 1st innings: Lunch - Day 3, Tea - Day 3,
Live Reports from previous days

WRIGHT, WATSON COMBINE TO WIN OVER WAUGH

It wasn't Wednesday and Walcott, Worrell and Weekes were not immediately in sight. But this was a day for the 'W's at the Sydney Cricket Ground nonetheless, as Damien Wright and Shane Watson combined to overcome the impact of a magnificent Mark Waugh innings and propel Tasmania to a tense 15-run first innings win.

Admittedly, paceman David Saker's impact was also particularly significant.

But, in the midst of an action-packed six hours of cricket, the third day of this Pura Cup match between New South Wales and Tasmania will probably be best remembered for what happened at 3:47pm.

For it was at that moment that Waugh, Wright and Watson were enjoined in the passage of play that all but settled a gripping battle for the first points of the two teams' seasons.

Waugh (168), endeavouring to plot New South Wales' course to the two points from the ruin of a mid-innings collapse, lashed fiercely at a Watson (3/88) leg cutter. Wright, at gully, worked hard and low to his left; flung an outstretched hand at a rapidly travelling ball and conceived a truly magnificent catch.

Suddenly at 9/462 as it chased Tasmania's 504, New South Wales was all but out of a contest that Waugh and fellow centurion Michael Bevan (102) had helped to ignite with a pair of superb innings.

"He was just going so well that I suppose we needed something really big to happen to get him out," said Wright of his remarkable interception.

"I was just thrilled; he hit it pretty well and the next minute it was literally in my hands!

"To come here in the first match of the year and take two points off these guys is great; we're really really happy with that. It's a brilliant start."

Though Jamie Cox, Dene Hills, Ricky Ponting and Bevan had all notched hundreds before him, Waugh ventured to - and beyond - the landmark with an aplomb that made his the best century of this match.

He was at his artful and elegant best, showing no ill effects from the finger injury he suffered two days ago and hitting the ball with a majesty that verged on the sublime. Classical drives, especially through the covers, were matched by cuts and leg glances of the highest quality.

Importantly, he also fashioned hope for his team where little had seemed to exist through the preceding two days of this match. With Bevan, he crafted a stand of 81 for the third wicket; he added another 113 for the fourth with Mark Higgs (37); and then led the way in further unlikely stands of 71 and 31 with tailenders Stuart MacGill (34) and Stuart Clark (31*) respectively.

"I don't think I've been in better nick," Waugh said at the end of play.

"I was happy with the innings and happy with how I hit the ball. Just a bit disappointed not to get us over the line for two points."

Ultimately, it was Wright's catch and a disastrous mini-collapse which saw four wickets tumble for the addition of only 20 runs in mid-afternoon which scuttled the chase.

Higgs, Shane Lee (17), Brad Haddin (0) and Don Nash (0) departed in what amounted to little more than the batting of an eyelid as Saker (4/115) and Watson combined to suddenly extract life from a generally benign pitch.

MacGill then frustrated the visitors for 43 minutes by hitting out agriculturally - and surviving twice as he offered catches to Cox at third slip off Watson - and Clark also helped to narrow the margin between the teams. Ultimately, though, it was not enough.

Tasmania had reached 0/30 in its second innings by stumps, ensuring that it will now take an overall lead of 45 runs into the final day.

But it appears that the match might now be as good as over anyway, given that either team's prospects of claiming wickets in quick succession over the closing six hours shape as remote.

Which is a shame in a number of ways. Because, more than once over three days of high quality cricket, this game has crystallized what it is that is good about the domestic game in Australia.

POINTS IN THE BALANCE AFTER ACTION-LADEN SESSION

The battle for first innings points inexorably draws on in the Pura Cup match between New South Wales and Tasmania here at the Sydney Cricket Ground. And not even the most action-packed session of the match - which has taken the Blues to a score of 8/446 by tea on the third day - has provided a resolution.

For the first time in this contest, New South Wales looked to have gained an edge when Mark Waugh (162*) and Mark Higgs (37) took their fourth wicket stand to a mark of 113 before the latter finally lost concentration.

In playing across the line of a delivery angled in at the top of off stump from David Saker (3/106), though, Higgs ushered in an uncomfortable period which saw the Blues disastrously surrender four wickets for the addition of just 27 runs.

After a few breezy strokes, Shane Lee (17) fell to precisely the same mode of dismissal, though his error was to play slightly inside the line rather than across it.

Brad Haddin (0), fresh from carting Tasmania's bowlers to all points of the compass in a one-day match on Sunday, showed form to be the elusive commodity that it is when he was immediately trapped plumb in front as he attempted to work a Shane Watson (2/69) delivery to leg.

Don Nash (0) also fell for a duck when he waved his blade at a brisk delivery from Watson and presented wicketkeeper Sean Clingeleffer with a catch to his right.

Having at last extracted life from a largely benign surface, the Tasmanians were cock-a-hoop by this stage and their mood should have improved further as Stuart MacGill (34) wafted lazily several times at Watson. Two catches arrowed in Jamie Cox's direction at third slip were each grassed before MacGill's score had even reached double figures, and a number of other chances narrowly eluded the fieldsmen as the leg spinner unfurled an innings littered with agricultural strokes.

With Waugh collecting a succession of singles to a defensively-set field for him all the while, MacGill frustrated the Tasmanians for 43 minutes with a display that must have proved nothing short of crude and offensive to them.

He was finally removed courtesy of a fine overhead catch from Watson as he lifted a full delivery from Andrew Downton (2/94) off the line of leg stump. But not before the pendulum had tilted close to a vertical position again.

Tasmania's life continued to be made difficult by Waugh, whose timing and selection of which deliveries to punish has been a study in excellence. He survived two vociferous lbw appeals from Shaun Young (0/47) with his score at 2 late yesterday, and also top edged a pull only a matter of inches clear from a frantically pursuing Dene Hills when on 142, but has otherwise only rarely played a false stroke.

After a session that yielded five wickets and as many as 151 runs, it is largely on his shoulders that the resolution that this two-point battle will rest.

INTERNATIONAL STARS STEER BLUES AWAY FROM TROUBLE

Michael Bevan has produced the fourth century of this match, and Mark Waugh is closing in on a fifth, as play continues on the third day of this Pura Cup contest between New South Wales and Tasmania here at the Sydney Cricket Ground.

At lunch, the Blues are positioned at a first innings score of 3/295 as they pursue Tasmania's 504.

This has been another morning on which bat has dominated ball on a pitch that is showing very little evidence of deterioration. It has been Waugh (90*) who has contributed the bulk of the 127 runs added in the two hours of play, numerous trademark cover drives featuring alongside repeated working of the ball off the line of his pads.

But that's not to undersell the contributions of Bevan (102) and Mark Higgs (18*) at the other end either. The former's insatiable appetite for runs at state level - as well as in Sydney and against Tasmania - not only yielded his 50th first-class century just over 30 minutes into the day's play. But it also appears to have gone a long distance toward ensuring that any danger that New South Wales might have faced in being dismissed short of the follow-on mark of 355 has been averted.

Bevan reached his landmark with an exquisitely timed stroke to the square leg boundary and it was typical of his strokemaking throughout the innings. Excellent placement was matched by controlled timing off both the front and back foot, and his shots were generally more grounded than Ansett's fleet of commercial jets.

For their part, the Tasmanians have toiled manfully. The wicket of Bevan represented due reward for the efforts of Andrew Downton (1/68) and Damien Wright (1/60) to beat and contain him just outside the line of off stump for much of his 37 minutes at the crease this morning. And things might have looked significantly better for the visitors if Higgs had not received the benefit of the doubt from Umpire David Brandon as he assessed a desperately close lbw appeal from Downton with the left hander's score at 1.