On 21st May, Year 8 & 9 girls took part in their first rounders fixture at home against Wednesfield Academy Year 9 students. The game was made up of two, ten minute innings. Smestow won the toss and chose to field first. The team quickly adapted to new fielding formations having not played together before. The connections between back stop and 2nd post were particularly fantastic, with accurate throws and safe catches which resulted in Wednesfield often being stuck at 1st post, unable to score. Brilliant decisions were made by deep fielders, making the hard choice whether to throw to 2nd or 4th post. We covered ground well and understood the batters capabilities to change our positioning appropriately. When batting we made some good hits and ran excellently to 2nd post, quickly adding up half rounders.
The first innings ended an exciting draw 5 ½ – 5 ½ .
During the second innings fielding was still strong. The batters were slightly more inconsistent but there was a lot more power in the shots, leading to multiple rounders scored. The running also put a lot of pressure on 2nd post and missed catches by Wednesfield meant we kept adding ½ rounders to the scoreboard. Most impressively the students positioned themselves towards the edge of the box tactically which meant they also scored additional half rounders from no balls at the body.
The second innings ended a close 7 – 6 ½ to Smestow! The final result was 12 – 12 ½ to Smestow Academy.
Well done to the following students for representing our school and winning their first rounders fixture:
A L Steadman
T-J Smallwood
K Wunganai
Y Gaillard
H Stanley
E-M Fox
F Heath
F Zirta-Gimbien
Batter of the match – A L Steadman
Fielder of the match – K Wungunai
