WA claim National Indigenous Cricket Championships men’s title with five-wicket grand final win over Victoria

WA have claimed their second National Indigenous Cricket Championships men’s title within the span of three years. Having gone unbeaten through the pool stage of the tournament, a side featuring former Australian all-rounder D’Arcy Short won back the trophy by beating Victoria by five wickets in Sunday’s grand final, tracking down a victory target of 123 with 23 deliveries to spare. Captain Brock Larance starred in the decider, claiming 2-20 from his four overs of off-spin before blasting 83 not out from 50 deliveries in a brisk knock which featured seven sixes, including a reverse sweep which sailed over the boundary to seal the result. Short scored 209 runs and claimed eight wickets over the course of the championships, figuring as one of three WA players in the team of the tournament alongside Bevan Bennell and Dane Ugle. Bennell, a prolific run-scorer in a number of country competitions who has spent his recent years with Great Boulder in the Eastern Goldfields Cricket Association, finished as the competition’s leading run-scorer with 239. Ugle, who won the Olly Cooley medal for the best and fairest player in WA Premier Cricket with Rockingham-Mandurah in 2016-17, was the tournament’s equal leading wicket-taker with 12 while also contributing 162 runs. WA’s women’s side were not able to defend their title, exiting the tournament with a semifinal defeat at the hands of eventual beaten grand finalists New South Wales on Saturday. But the State dominated the team of the tournament, having five players chosen for a 12-player side. State-contracted batter Mikayla Hinkley and her fellow co-captain Veronica Keen both earned selection alongside Charlotte Toohey, Regina Deleeuw and Elsie Simpson.