One more week of the season left. One more chance to get to personal milestones or clinch team positions. One more chance to contact ACC for cricket related reasons before pre-season!

MPCC Needs You!

The club is on the lookout for new bar managers. If you hold a current bar manager's license, or are interested in obtaining one with help from the club, and would be interested in acting as one of our bar managers in future, please get in touch with the club via mpcricket@xtra.co.nz to have a chat.

Upcoming MPCC Events

Owls vs Hawks - Sunday 30 March

The traditional Owls vs Hawks season-ender takes place the day after the end of our regular season, from 12pm on Sunday 30 March. Chief training trash-talker Louis Stevens will be leading the Hawks in their quest to make it to the ground on time and in one piece and try to get one over on the Owls, now under the confirmed leadership of Masters skipper Petros Kapralos. If you're keen to be involved on either side (under/over-30s) let your team captain, Bellsy, Sam, Louis or Petros know and make sure you're part of the last bragging rights of the season!

MPCC Awards Night - Saturday 5 April

Wrapping up the season will be our annual Awards Night, taking place this season on the evening of Saturday 5 April from 7pm at the clubrooms. Get along, celebrate your clubmates' achievements and reflect on another season at MPCC.

Meat raffles at The Brewers

Every Friday evening during the season, MPCC is selling meat raffles at our sponsor, The Brewers, in Merivale. All teams will take a couple of turns doing the selling - this week our Championship side are on selling duty. All club members are encouraged to head down at 5.30 support the raffles and our sponsor and get in some pre-match predictions for Saturday's games.

Thanks to our sponsors

As always, a huge thank you to our club and team sponsors, Sporting Edge, BBS Timbers, Bombay Tandoor, The Brewers, Burger Station, ITM Dyers Road and VIP Trade for your continuing support of Merivale Papanui CC. Your generous help makes a massive difference to the cricketing experience we can provide to our junior and adult members this season.

Congratulations to Div 2 Red skipper, Michael Beattie, whose 4-55 off 16 overs vs Riccarton was enough to make him the second bowler past 50 wickets this season. In the process, he also became the 19th bowler in club history to pass 400 wickets. Still work to do, however as he's less than halfway to club patron Ray Pitcher's club record of 954 scalps!

Congratulations to Club President and Burger Station Div 2 Red batter, Ranjith Rangarajan, who scored his first half-century for the club (58) in his side's narrow first innings win against Halswell.

Congratulations to recent BBS Timbers Div 7 recruit, Angus Baddeley, who scored 91 in his side's win over the Wanderers, also picking up 3 wickets with the ball. Angus currently has a batting average of 174 for MPCC after two innings for the season. Hopefully many more to come from a player to watch.

Congratulations to Championship batter, Flynn Warren, who bettered his previous top score for the club (set last week vs OBC) in scoring 77 against St Albans.

Congratulations to North West Youth 3rd XI Green's Preston Williams, whose score of 110 in the 3rd XI derby helped his side to a commanding win.

Congratulations to North West Youth 3rd XI Green's Lucas Roan, whose 64 further strengthened his side's total.

Congratulations to North West Youth Colts batter Muhammad Haroon, who hit 65 in his side's game against Christchurch Boys High.

Congratulations to another North West Youth Colts batter, Luke Spicer, who scored 58 in the same game.

Match Reports from Saturday 22 March

MP Sporting Edge Championship vs St Albans @ Hagley Nursery Ground (2-day - Day 1)

Saturday 22nd March saw the last round of the two-day championship being played out at ‘The Nursery’ in Hagley Park. Our Merivale Papanui were seniors looking to reverse the fortunes of the past few weeks as they took the field against St Albans Sabres after winning the toss. It took just 6 overs before Leo Spilsbury had opener Samarakoon caught for 4. A 59-run partnership between the Sabres' Rees and Kearns took the score to 72 before Sam Gillespie had Rees lbw for 32. The team had to wait a while before Lachie Cameron James then had Kearns out caught for 54 in the 37th over. Harry Meehan chimed in getting the 4th wicket of Sharma for 21 leaving the Sabres at 123/4 in the 40th over. The Sabres batting was steady, and they reached a respectable 243 all out off 60 overs with Meehan and Spilsbury sharing 2 wkts a piece and Gillespie taking 3/53 off 17 overs.

With plenty of work to do, it was clear in the sheds that we were ready to take the fight to the St Albans lads. Flynn Warren kept the opening spot for the 2nd week, partnered with Alexander Lankeshwar, who was unfortunately out early and then lost Matt Ling shortly after. Lingy provided a brief but eye-catching burst with 9 off just 6 balls – a small birthday knock that added a bit of extra cheer to the day. However, the boys were in a bit of a pickle at 13/2 after 3 overs. Harry Meehan and Flynn both put up a very determined effort and batted for 31 overs. Flynn hammering out a solid 77 off 103 – notching up 12 boundaries to keep the momentum going. Meanwhile, Harry stood firm, staying not out on 41 to anchor our chase, while Wezley Masterton and Luke Piper chipped in with quick contributions to keep the score ticking over.

Flynn

MP Sporting Edge Div. 2 Red vs Riccarton @ Bishopdale (2-Day – Day 1 - 1st innings loss)

MP Div 2 Red took on Riccarton in the final 2 day fixture of their season. With very little on the line except some personal pride (our place in the grade seemingly safe, and no titles within reach, nor promotion from the grade) we set about to put a strong performance on the board to cap the season off. Beattie won the toss and elected to bowl: a ball of old from Beattie to start proceedings, firing down the leg side for four wides, Gilly having flashbacks from his 2016 athletics behind the stumps. Beattie eventually got the first breakthrough in the 7th, and another in the 9th, Riccarton 38/2 after 9. Lyle continued his good form before getting injured mid-way through an over, but not before claiming a wicket of his own in the 12th. George settled in for a long spell, well assisted by the newest left arm David at MP (David Moore), George producing good figures again of 2/44 off his 12-over spell and David bowling 7 overs, picking up his first MP wicket with 1/12. Beattie brought himself back on to try and get the wickets required for 50 for the season and managed to do so, ending up with figures of 4/55 off 16, bringing up his 50th for the season and 400th for the club. Riccarton eventually navigated their 45 overs 9/154, probably 20-30 ahead of where we ideally wanted them to be all out.

Unfortunately, we didn't get off to a great start, Tom and Shane both falling for ducks, Gilly, Sam & Mario all for single figure scores. Louis and Basa provided some brief resistance for 15 a piece, but we were all out for a dismal 67. 87 behind on first innings, so we have managed to avoid the follow on and give ourselves a chance to roll Riccarton cheaply come Saturday, who will no doubt be looking to pile on quick runs and give themselves as much time as possible to go for the outright win, but the MP boys will have other plans to roll them for as little as possible and chase it down.

Mike Beattie

MP Burger Station Div 2 Black vs Halswell @ Edgar Mac 1 (2-Day - Day 1 - 1st innings win)

Burger Station Div 2 Black were treated to our first game of the season on Edgar Mac no. 1. Halswell lost the toss and Bellsy opted to bat, with the opposition starting the day with only eight on the field due to late arrivals. Nonetheless, our progress was watchful after Ash (5) hit one back to the bowler early on. Ranjith and Darren took things steadily with the opening bowlers sticking to tight lines, getting us through to the ball before drinks, when Darren was given out LBW for 27. Hemanshu (11) and Bellsy (18) both tried to push the run rate along a little quicker with run-a-ball knocks but both found fielders’ hands, which brought Richard out to join Ranjith. Another watchful partnership followed, until Ranjith finally gave up a catch trying to accelerate a little, returning for 58 off 137 balls – his first MPCC half-century. We then lost our way a little as Ice (2), Josiah (0) and Jason (3) returned quickly. Dave and Richard finished off the innings with a couple of overs of singles and a welcome four off a no-ball from Richard as Dave was run out for 5 on the last ball, leaving Richard 21* (his highest MP score).

168/9 on the number one was probably 30 or so less than we’d have liked, so we needed to bowl well. Dave and Jack started things off reasonably well, with Dave (0-8 off 8) believing he’d snared an LBW on ball one – the umpire had other ideas – but then having to settle for keeping things tight rather than taking wickets. After about a dozen overs, Bellsy had a go and got our first breakthrough with an LBW. A stubborn partnership was then broken up when Darren caught one set batsman on the boundary off Bellsy, before Jase grabbed a wicket with a back of the hand slower ball to get rid of their top-scorer. Halswell went from 84/2 to 84/5 as Jase picked up two more wickets in his next over, then 86/6 when he got his fourth a little later. However, they then staged a fightback, helped by Dave inaccurately reading an attacking shot from their only remaning top-order bat and charging in off the boundary, only to see the ball land behind him for 4. From 86/6 after 31, Halswell suddenly raced to 131/6 off 38, before Bellsy brought back Jack, whose extra pace took the stumps of their best batter. However, Halswell continued to score, and ended up needing 11 off the last over for an unlikely first innings win. When a boundary was hit first ball, things looked dicey, but Jack kept his nerve, helped by a catch taken at cover by Richard, as Halswell closed out their innings on 167/8, one run behind. Jack ended up 2-43 off 9; Bellsy bowled 17 in a row to end up 2-59, while Jase picked up 4-52 off 11.

A first innings win is a first innings win, if not quite as resounding a one as we’d started to hope for, and we’ll be back next week to post a demanding target and see about finishing the season with an outright win at home. Big thanks also to Josiah for volunteering to bat on one leg when we were a player short on Saturday morning, and to Revanth Krishna, who volunteered to sub-field for Josiah and grabbed his first catch for the club off Jason’s bowling.

MP Div 4 vs Sydenham @ Sydenham (Loss)

We were against Sydenham Goats at Sydenham park. We won the toss and elected to field first. We started well and very disciplined bowling saw no loose deliveries in the first 10 overs where they were around 25 runs. All bowlers bowled well and we started getting regular wickets and restricted them to 125 after 40 overs. 

Suraj and Abhi were the openers for this game. We lost Suraj early in the 3rd over where he could only score 6 runs, hitting one 4. Akki came to bat and then a great partnership started to building up. Abhi got run out after scoring 20. We were 45 for 2 after 20 overs. Then after Akki got out wickets started falling. Our middle order and lower order couldn't achieve the target. We were all out on 96. We will try to focus on our next and final game and end this season on a high note.

Abhinav Jaswal 

MP Div 6 vs Ohoka @ Mandeville (Loss)

The Panthers were assigned the picturesque Mandeville Sports Ground for their latest fixture against Ohoka, following a mid-week change of venue. With skipper Andy A’s well-documented struggles at the toss, the responsibility was handed to Glen, who fared no better, losing the toss and consigning the Panthers to bat first on a slow & low green pitch. Openers Andy R and Dean displayed patience against disciplined swing bowling, negating the new ball’s threat before Dean was dismissed for 8. Roger, promoted to No. 3 for a second consecutive week, began cautiously, displaying solid defensive technique before unfurling a series of blistering strokes down the ground. He combined with Andy R for a 39-run stand before the latter played on for 26. Max then joined Roger at the crease and produced an elegant display of cover drives and square cuts, showing remarkable focus while observing Ramadan. The pair built a promising 41-run partnership before Roger was dismissed in agonising fashion, bowled attempting a lap shot just one run short of a well-deserved half-century. Glen and Max carried on until Glen was trapped lbw for 9. The returning opening bowler then removed Joel for a duck via a sharp caught-and-bowled dismissal. AJ struck a few lusty blows in support of Max, but the latter eventually fell for a well-made 37. AJ followed soon after for 14, triggering a lower-order collapse that saw the Panthers bowled out for a modest 158. 

With a subpar total to defend, the Panthers knew early wickets were crucial. Isuka and Andy A opened the bowling, with Andy A making the initial breakthrough in his third over, castling the opposition opener. Isuka then struck in his sixth over as Glen took a sharp catch at cover. Andy R made an immediate impact upon being introduced, picking up a wicket in his first over to leave Ohoka 84/3 after 20 overs. Max toiled tirelessly, delivering eight consecutive overs, and was finally rewarded in his last over with a sharp catch behind the stumps by Dean. Andy A returned for his final spell and reignited Panthers’ hopes, claiming three quick wickets. A brilliant run-out from Glen further tightened the contest, reducing Ohoka to 133/8, still 26 runs short of victory. However, with a set batsman at the crease, Ohoka counterattacked, finding the boundary with increasing regularity to seal victory with more than two overs to spare. In the end, the Panthers' total was around 20 runs shy of a truly competitive score, and had a few half-chances been taken, the outcome could have been different. They will now regroup and set their sights on next week's third vs. fourth playoff clash.

Andy Anderson

MP BBS Timbers Div 7 vs Wanderers @ Edgar Mac 2 (Win)

BBS Timbers Div 7 took on the Wanderers at home on No. 2. Nana won the toss after a brief team discussion and elected to bat. With a shuffled batting order to give everyone a go, Pav and Angus opened the innings. Pav didn't last long, falling LBW for 3 (though he claimed it was outside leg). That brought Tim C to the crease, and together with Angus, they built a solid 60-run partnership before Tim was caught for 32. Next in was Frosty—normally a No. 9 batsman—stepping up at No. 4. He and Angus batted brilliantly, putting on a 105-run stand. Frosty was eventually bowled for an impressive 44, his highest score for MP so far. After his departure, wickets fell quickly as the team pushed to accelerate the run rate. Angus anchored the innings, making a well-crafted 91 before being stumped. BBS Timbers posted a competitive 231 on a tricky pitch. 

The Wanderers' chase began with Nick opening from the club end, striking early with a breakthrough in his first over. Blake partnered from the other end and, while wicketless, bowled with great control. The opposition struggled under pressure, with their only major highlight being Barry’s 88 before Ayan bowled him. Fielding was sharp, with Mr Statue, Muthu, pulling off a brilliant run-out, well done mate. Nick sealed the match with a direct-hit run-out, ending the Wanderers' innings at 208 in the 37th over. Bowling figures: Nick: 2-19, Angus: 3-32, Pav: 1-22, Ayan: 1-26. 

A solid all-around performance—well done, lads!

Nana

MP Masters vs Ohoka @ Mandeville (Win)

Unsure as to who's home game this was, Mandeville being more familiar to us than our own surfaces, P.K. called incorrectly and Chook taking the opportunity to have a bat first. Andy Scott, in a destructive mood, got a couple of blistering shots away in the first over, indicating an upbeat tempo mindset. Johnson, certainly more circumspect, kept himself well in check, absorbed a good portion of the new ball, blunting the initial attack. It wasn't until the tenth over and a lapse of judgement from Scott that the first wicket was secured, Mendis foxing him to tip back off stick, Andy out for 26 (28) and Ohoka 33/1. Cartmell replaced SVG for the eleventh and bowled a great spell until drinks with Mendis who bowled out and made a connection with Kokiri who was selected to get to the interval, Originals making that mark without further loss, 52/1, Johnson and Archer at the crease. Of course, this break is always a disruption, and it proved itself once again when Cartmell pulled off a double strike first over back, short ball to Johnson cut into the chest of Zwies at cover falling for 21 (56) and backing that up with the dismissal of Archer top edging to Browne at a fly slip for 3 (24). Things got worse in the next over, Loffhagen's 0 (3) aerial drive plucked out of the air by Hume at extra cover and Prebble running himself out first ball hitting to Zwies at point and taking off and involving himself in a mix up with Thompson, the wayward throw collected and thrown back onto the stumps by Bell playing as keeper for this match. 57/5 a couple of overs after drinks was obviously not the result Ohoka was after at that time, but the timely kick solidified a resolve between Thompson and Powell. They combined for a 45-run partnership over 11 overs before the Janitor got in on the act, striking in his first, slow balling Powell's stumps, sending him back for 19 (22). Browne was bought in and should have had immediate success, but hands became an issue for one particular person, who could catch a cold and absolutely nothing else on this particular day... Thankfully the lapses didn't cost an exorbitant amount as Browne picked off Mcleans (1) stumps and backed that up with the important dismissal of Thompson, C and B for 45, an innings punctuated with strong drives that found the boundary with consummate ease. That left D Archer (9*) and Nutthall (3*) to take it home under pressure to end Ohoka's innings at 134/8, Browne and Cartmell being pick of our bowlers with 6/1/16/2 and 8/3/14/2 respectively. 

Having been in trouble chasing a similar total last time we visited Mandeville, there were stern words at the break between innings reinforcing the need to preserve wickets early and give ourselves a fighting chance to avoid the pitfalls that allowed for a tense finish to that last game. Verma and Bell took it all to heart and constructed a nice little foundation of 36 from the first 14 overs, Prebble being the matrix to provide the first breakthrough, that of Verma, adjudged LBW for 26 (43). Unfortunately, this set off a mini collapse as Bell was caught by Powell off the bowling of Hallmark for 10 (46) and Zwies getting an absolute pearler, swing and seam clipping top of off from Prebble, leaving for 1 (7) and MPCC in a spot of bother at 39/3. Turns out this was not going to as big a problem as first thought with Browne coming in to pair up with Hume... 70 runs later and several injuries, the partnership breaking through the drink's interval and a good portion of the second half of our allotted overs, when Browne tried to go to the well once too often, Powell the recipient, capturing his wicket at 38 (25). Crimp in, was respectful and judious with the defense allowing Hume to take toll of anything off line or length and procuring another half century with a pull through midwicket that also tipped us over the target score, Crimp coming out unscathed 7* (24), and Hume 51* (67). Prebble best of the opposition bowlers 6/2/17/2. Another hard-fought encounter between the teams topped off with a sideline discussion session at the Premier final being played on the number 1 (which Ohoka took out)... 

Pickle

MP Bombay Tandoor T20 vs OBC (Win by Default)

Our lads showed up, theirs didn't. Not the most fun way to win a game.

North West Youth Cricket Results

NWY 1st XI vs Christ's College 2nd XI (Loss)

NWY 89 (J. Welford 33)

Christ's College 90/4 (Z Hussanussaman 2/11)

NWY 2nd XI vs St Andrews 3rd XI (Win)

NWY 118 (Z. Chalmers 34; S. Carrell 25)

STAC 100 (Y. Sharma 4/29; L. Kerr 4/32)

NWY Colts vs CBHS Blue (Loss)

NWY 210 (M. Haroon 65; L. Spicer 58; A. Walikumbura 37)

CBHS 211/5 (R. Earl 2/23)

NWY 3rd XI Green vs NWY 3rd XI Black (Win)

NWY Green 270/5 (P. Williams 110; L. Roan 64; I. Khan 28)

NWY Black 155 (O. Grace 29; W. Hicks 28; A. Maule 3/20; L. Roan 2/24; M. Inns 2/33)

NWY 3rd XI Black vs NWY 3rd XI Green (Loss)

As above

NWY Year 10 vs Rolleston (Loss)

NWY 51

Rolleston 50/8 (T. Ellis 3/7; S Atri 2/3; C. Varcoe 2/9)

NWY Year 9A vs Shirley Boys High (Loss)

NWY 136 (J. White 35; H. Innes 25)

SBHS 139/5 (D. Temple-Doig 2/6)

NWY Year 9 Raiders vs NCYCC (Loss)

NCYCC 221/5 (D. Jorgensen 3/16)

NWY 120/9 (C. Miles 28)

Article added: Wednesday 26 March 2025