Holland spins web over hapless SA

A third-straight Sheffield Shield title is in sight for Victoria after Jon Holland delivered a ruthless day-three bowling performance, leaving South Australia searching for a way back into the competition decider in Alice Springs.

Holland (7-82) exploited a parched Traeger Park pitch to cut a swathe through the Redbacks' top order, picking up his second five-wicket haul of the season to skittle South Australia for 287.

Bowling into footmarks created largely by two days of toil from the opposing quicks, the left-arm spinner eclipsed Chadd Sayers’ day-old mark for the fourth-best innings figures ever in a Shield final.

Posing a particular threat to the left-handers, Holland dismissed all four southpaws in South Australia’s top-order as the Redbacks conceded a 200-run first-innings deficit.

A generous offer from Victoria, who only need to draw to take home the Shield silverware once again, to ask South Australia to follow-on seemed about as likely as one of their players calling for a jumper in the dry desert heat.

And though South Australia’s slim hopes of claiming a drought-breaking Shield title were kept somewhat alive with two late wickets, the Bushrangers, on 2-38 at stumps with Dean (12 not out) and nightwatchman Chris Tremain (three not out), are well in control of the match holding a 238-run lead.

Resuming on 1-19 this morning, Jake Weatherald took it to the Bushrangers early in the day as the Redbacks pursued a sizable first-innings tally, preferably in quick time.

Having batted patiently for five off 31 balls in last night’s session, Weatherald signalled his intentions with a lofted inside-out cover-driven boundary against the spin of Holland.

The opener’s partnership with the more watchful Ferguson grew to 76 before Holland found the edge of the recent Test debutant and was snaffled by Cameron White at slip.

More worrying for the Redbacks though was his dismissal of Travis Head, trapped lbw by a ball that spat out of the rough.

After a vociferous appeal against Jake Lehmann for a bat-pad catch at short-leg, Holland got his man two balls later when he hit one straight to the same fielder in Rob Quiney.

James Pattinson (2-47 off 17 overs) clean-bowled Tom Cooper in the first over after lunch, the speedster claiming his second scalp of the innings having removed opener John Dalton in the same fashion before stumps on day two.

Victoria skipper Cameron White set a number of unconventional fields across the course of the day as the Redbacks continued to score at a decent clip despite the consistent flow of wickets.

Daniel Christian bowled with only one fielder on the leg-side for a number of overs at Weatherald, and the left-hander reeled in his aggressive instincts as he passed 50 for the first time since the Big Bash break.

But he too fell into Holland’s web, bowled for 60 trying to cut, while Joe Mennie became his fifth victim when his attempted sweep ballooned up and was caught by a plunging Seb Gotch.

It ended a promising partnership between Mennie and Carey, the latter notching his 500th run for the season as the pair put on 68 for the seventh wicket.

Carey survived a close direct-hit run-out chance that was sent upstairs to the third umpire, the ‘keeper-batsman diving to make his ground following a nifty bit of fielding from Aaron Finch.

Carey employed the sweep shot to good effect to counter the threat of Holland and didn’t hesitate to use the reverse-sweep either when faced with another unusual field from White that featured just two men on the off-side for Holland.

But the sweep proved his downfall when he struck one straight at White at square-leg just after tea, his dismissal putting paid to the prospect of him dragging South Australia back into the game. 

The Redbacks’ last four batsmen all made contributions, scoring 107 runs between them - likely driven by the dread of having to front up to bowl for a third-straight day - but Holland had his seventh scalp when Daniel Worrall fed White a third catch for the innings.

Victoria raced out of the blocks, as Travis Dean and Marcus Harris picked up from their Shield final-record first-innings opening stand of 224, taking 24 from the first four overs.

Two quick wickets – Harris well caught by Tom Cooper at first slip to hand Sayers his eighth victim for the match, and No.3 Quiney caught at mid-on off Worrall – forced them to send out Chris Tremain as a nightwatchman.

The right-hander struck his maiden first-class ton when asked to perform the same duty in Victoria’s last match at this venue, one of a few outcomes South Australia will be dearly hoping don’t come to pass tomorrow.