Cricket North's 2019-20 season came to a premature close last week with minor premier Westbury likely to be awarded the title.
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In the first of a series of reviews, The Examiner looks over the season that was for Riverside.
Season in a nutshell: After welcoming back some experienced talent in the off-season, Riverside made a promising start and went through the T20 Cup undefeated before falling to Launceston in the final.
The Blues looked assured of making their first finals in three years following a rousing win over Launceston, but were overrun in the last two rounds to finish fourth.
Team highlight: The Blues completed a clean sweep of South Launceston with an unlikely day two comeback in round 12.
Lyndon Stubbs took three wickets to spark a late-order collapse of 4-5 to seal a two-run first innings victory.
Team lowlight: A rain-affected round 14 draw with Mowbray that cost the Blues a finals spot and a disappointing batting effort in the T20 final.
Individual performance: Sam Lockett's 5-19 in round 16 was the only five-for against Westbury this season and his first at A-grade level.
What worked: A strengthened middle order with Patty Mackrell, Matthew Kerrison and Ramesh Sundra.
What didn't work: West Indian recruit Kirk Thompson promised plenty but was back home mid-season.
Best recruit: Patty Mackrell returned after a four-year layoff and hit three straight 50s to finish as the club's fourth-highest scorer.
Surprise packet: Sam Lockett took 15 wickets at 18.93 after spending most of last season in third grade.
ELSEWHERE IN SPORT
MVP: Tom Garwood. The skipper led the way with 615 runs at 34.17 and 18 wickets across the three formats and clubbed five half-centuries.
Captain says: We've come a long way with where we came from with the young group we had.
It was very disappointing to miss out on finals obviously, but what we've got in our group and the young guys that are coming through is really good to see.
We won games of cricket that we probably shouldn't have won and that stands up for a lot.
Sam Artis before Christmas he was phenomenal with the white ball and to have a couple of older experienced guys come back into the side like Patty Mackrell and Matthew Kerrison and Rama - all three of those guys won games of cricket for us which was exactly what we needed.
Grand final tip:
It all depended on the day, it's hard to know.
South Launceston have got some really good batsmen, especially Nathan Philip, he's a game-winner for them but Westbury have Dane Anderson.
Both sides have game-winners so it's hard to say but on reflection probably Westbury, they're a really good all-round side.