The last few weeks remaining of Ovens Valley United’s A grade campaign have taken on an interesting complexion following their weekend match against the Bushrangers.

Batting first at the Gardens Oval, Ovens Valley managed 8/199, before Benalla chased it down in the 43rd over with four wickets in hand.

Winning the toss and bowling seemed to be the right play for Benalla, as Conor Brodie struck early to reduce the Tigers to 2/14.

Geeth Alwis (61 off 80) and Noah White (37 off 51) went about rebuilding the innings, running hard between the wickets and gathering momentum.

After White was caught top edging a mis-timed pull shot, Joel Jordan came to the crease and played an incredible knock.

Jordan and Alwis would put on 42 together, and when Alwis was adjudged LBW trying to slog-sweep Xavier De Fazio in the 32nd over, Jordan would carry his bat, working with the tail to post a commendable total of 8/199, with Jordan (55* off 76) and Joe Monk (3* off four) at the crease at the end of 45 overs.

With the runs on the board, the Tigers would feel confident about defending it, but Benalla’s batters had other ideas.

An unbeaten knock from James Carboon batting at four would drive the Bushrangers over the line, the classy batter finishing with 85* from 104 balls, an innings of supreme patience and skill.

Benalla’s Brayden Stepien did what he normally does and went hard, launching the Bushrangers’ innings, but his partner Jonty Priest was less fortunate, edging James Neary to first slip to be removed for a duck.

Stepien (19 off 16) and Vishal Sharma (16 off 13) would get starts, but it would be the partnership between Carboon and Vaughan Kirk (39 off 54) which would break the chase open.

After coming in at 3/37, Kirk and Carboon would push the score past 100 – Mitchell Wheelens’ 29* off 45 would see the Bushrangers home.

Tigers captain Seamus Phillips said they were outplayed by a more clinical squad on the day.

“We just couldn’t score quick enough towards the end of our innings, 220-230 was probably a par score, so we were a little bit under,” he said.

“Bowling-wise, we just couldn’t continually take wickets, they got too many partnerships and got away from us, we couldn’t reel them back in.

“We just got bogged down in little periods, lost wickets at bad times around drinks breaks.

“They just bowled tight, bowled well, took the pace off when they needed to – we struggled to rotate strike enough.

“A couple of the openers – myself, [Daniel] Saville, whoever else opens – need to find some runs, and the lower order need to just value their wickets a bit and chip in with some late runs as well.

“It’s what we did well at the start of the year, blokes batting seven or eight contributed with the bat to help get us to a total, whereas we’re struggling to do that at the moment.”

Ovens Valley sit second overall with two matches remaining, and are essentially one win away from a home semi-final.

The Tigers will have their chance to reclaim their winning ways when they head up to Yarrawonga for the second time this season on Saturday.

“We just want to go to Yarra, try and find a bit of that form and momentum we had at the start of the year,” Phillips said.

“If we can get back to that, I think on our day we can beat anyone.

“Man for man, we’re as good as any other team in the comp, we’re just letting ourselves down in the field with the ball a little bit.”

In other grades, OVU president Thomas Chettleburgh led the A reserve side to victory over Delatite with his maiden century.

Chettleburgh slapped an unbeaten 104* from 122 balls at the top of the order to see the Tigers chase down Delatite’s 9/174 total in 37 overs.