Coleambally Nomads are the team to beat this season — but it hasn’t always been like that.
The Nomads are winding back the clock with their performances as they come close to a clean sweep of the Griffith District Cricket Association competitions.
Playing out at Coleambally and Griffith, the club’s U13 Milliken Shield and second grade team are league leaders.
The motivation from an undefeated Twenty20 competition victory has Coleambally preparing to add two more trophies to their cabinet.
Club rep Michael Hodgson has been astounded by the quality of play they are showing this season.
“The last probably four or five years we haven’t been particularly strong in second or third grade,” Hodgson said.
“Before then we were, we won the second grade comp eight years in a row. Lately we haven’t been dominant; this year we’ve picked up some players and picked up another gear.
“We’ve got a second grade side at the moment who are leading the competition.
They had a Twenty20 comp earlier in the year and we ended up undefeated and won that premiership.
“We’ve got Milliken Shield which is U13s and they are coming equal first on the ladder.
“We’ve lost two games all year through the rest of the season.
Third grade which is U17s comp we are probably sitting at about fourth, we’ve won probably three games out of the ones that haven’t been washed out.”
The third grade competition is where Coleambally find their toughest task. They sit in fourth spot, 17 points behind the Ex-Servicemens Club Eagles. Despite that, they are well in for a shout at the finals come the end of the season.
Hodgson has also lauded the impact some the Nomads recruits from Leeton have been in challenging for the premierships.
“The ones we’ve picked up … there are two kids who are probably in the top five or six cricketers in the competition which helps us out a lot.”
Asked who were the pick of those standout juniors, Hodgson didn’t need a pause: “Blake McDonald, and we’ve also got Chris Ianelli.”
In five innings McDonald has hit a high score of 50 and a total of 130 runs while Ianelli has notched up 117 from four matches all the while hitting an incredible 10 boundaries so far this season.
