The Jeparit Cricket Club is celebrating after winning their seventh West Wimmera Cricket Association premiership with a four wicket win over the Nhill Tigers on the weekend.

At the end of play on Saturday honours were even after Nhill Tigers having been dismissed for 166 in the last of their allotted 70 overs.

Most recent grand finals in this competition have been low scoring affairs with the team batting first regularly defending scores of between 100 and 120 as the team batting second focused on survival believing the runs would come. This cautious approach has often led to their downfall, but on this occasion Jeparit would need to be more proactive and pursue the target.

The chase did not start well, with veteran Nhill bowler Ash Dickinson striking with the third ball of the innings and by the tenth over he had taken three wickets and the Redbacks were reeling with only twelve runs on the board.

The rebuilding of the innings was led by Michael Preston and his son Liam (above) who first set about consolidating their positions at the crease and then worked on chipping away at the target.

By the afternoon tea break they had steadied the Redback to the point that they were two runs ahead of the Tigers at the same point of their innings the previous day, but importantly they went into the last session of the game with two more wickets in hand that the Tigers had.

When play resumed, the scoring rate increased and after a total of 37 overs together Michael was dismissed for 92 which brought to an end their partnership of 137 and importantly had whittled the target down to just a further 18 runs with more than ten overs still to play.

When Liam was dismissed three runs later having contributed 39 to the total, the Tigers got a faint sniff of a late run at victory, but the Association joint Most Valuable Player award winner, Jeremy Preston, steadied the innings.

Despite losing one further wicket, Jeremy (16 not out) and Tim Inkster (6 not out) saw the Redbacks safely past the target to claim the title.

Dickinson was the best of the Nhill bowlers with 4 for 34 and Ritchie Dodds was the only other to take a wicket and finished with 2 for 18.

This seventh title in the West Wimmera Cricket Association places Jeparit equal fourth with Kiata and Nhill Red, and behind only Gerang (16 premierships), Nhill Blue (13) and Boyeo (10) amongst the most successful teams in the 83 season history of the competition.

For the Jeparit club, this is their eighteenth premiership having won their first in 1906/07 in the Jeparit and District Cricket Association and followed this with five in the 1930s in the Wimmera Cricket Association and a further five in the strong Warracknabeal Cricket Association in the 1940s and 1950s.

This may prove be the last title decided in the West Wimmera Cricket Association with a delegates' meeting to be held by the end of the month to decide the future direction of cricket in the area after the Winiam club was forced to forfeit four games this season and there appears to be little prospect of the a Rainbow team returning the competition.


The victorious 2018 Jeparit cricket team - standing - (from left) co-captain Adrian King, Graham Grinter, Murphy Leach, co-captain Michael Preston, Steve Leach, Liam Preston, Jack Crowhurst, Brad Keller, Jeremy Preston, Tim Inkster.
Kneeling - Justin Knorpp, Jason Hutson, Trevor James.


Jeparit 6 for 176 defeated Nhill Tigers 166

Nhill Tigers Innings

L Smith ct S Leach b. J Knorpp 30
D Garoni    b. J Preston 11
M Dahlenburg      run out    16
A Cramer ct M Preston      b. J Knorpp 2
R Dodds run out    77
T Polkinghorne run out    13
L Dahlenburg ct A King b. M Preston      6
B Pollock ct A King b. J Knorpp 0
S Smith    b. J Knorpp 0
S Kessler    b. J Knorpp 1
S Gusman not out    1
Sundries       9
TOTAL    166

Jeparit Bowling

        O      M      R      W
G Grinter 5 0 11 0
J Preston 12 5 25 1
B Keller 9 4 16 0
J Crowhurst      14 7 23 0
A King 5 2 11 0
T Inkster 1 0 3 0
J Knorpp 13.4 2 41 5
M Preston 10 1 32 1

Jeparit Innings

T James ct T Polkinghorne      b. A Dickinson      0
B Keller ct T Polkinghorne b. A Dickinson 4
M Preston      ct Alexander b. R Dodds 92
J Knorpp lbw b. A Dickinson 0
L Preston ct T Polkinghorne b. A Dickinson 39
J Preston not out    16
A King ct B Pollock b. R Dodds 5
T Inkster not out    6
Sundries       14
TOTAL    6 for 176

Nhill Tigers Bowling

        O      M      R      W
A Dickinson 14 6 34 4
B Pollock 6 0 33 0
L Smith 13 7 16 0
A Cramer 10 2 26 0
M Dahlenburg      9 3 21 0
L Dahlenburg 7 1 17 0
S Kessler 2 0 9 0
R Dodds 4 0 18 2