Round 18 - ETPBC Div 5

A very hot day was forecasted and it managed to bring what it threatened, a very hot 37 degrees with hardly any cloud cover.

With that came in the reduced game rules, this enforces a maximum of 5 innnings or 90 minutes...

For someone like me who was starting on the bench, that brings in nothing but angst on whether you will be played or not.

Robbo started on the mound and got off to a flyer, zone was good and not many opposition hits through the five innings and really worked hard to keep them at bay - recorded some good strikeouts too!

Gussy again proved to be the one pitchers hate the most being walked twice, Cummo was the hitting specialist for the day twice with big bombs into the gaps and also superb speed to reach third twice for back to back triples.

Cummo's first proved to be a spark the team needed, most were telling him to hold off at 2nd but Cummo knew his pace would beat the throw to 3rd.

Hard to determine which highlight was the best on the day, so I think line honors need to go to both Cummo and Jonesy.

Jonesy is now known as the aerial defender, late in the 4th inning with runners in scoring position, a big bomb was hit to deep left field. For all money Jonesy looked beat on this one as it was well hit, from nowhere Jonesy lept back and took a superb catch which recorded the final out of the inning and any chance of Southern coming back to challenge the lead.

Red Sox ended up holding them off in the last to record a 7-1 win over Southern and securing our place in the finals.

I'm super excited, never in history of sport have I reached finals, not unless you count mixed netball which I don't think I will... During my football life at Happy Valley, my junior years were spent being thrashed by teams like Reynella and Morphett Vale, sometimes by 30 goals... During my senior years at the club we won games but never enough to reach finals, often missing out by one or two.

In my baseball career we haven't made it over the 4 years i've played, the year I missed our team won the flag.

This is something to savor and I look very forward to the challenge.

See you all down at Adelaide this weekend to cheer on the Red Sox!