Ross County Cricket Club lift North of Scotland Senior Cup trophy for second year in-a-row after six wicket victory over Northern Counties at The Abbey in Fort Augustus
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Ross County Cricket Club have retained the Nosca Senior Cup after defeating Northern Counties in this year's final.
In many ways, the Strathpeffer side would have been seen as the underdogs going in having lost three times to their opponents already across league and cup competitions this year.
However, the trophy will remain at Castle Leod for another year after County backed up their first Senior Cup win in over two decades last year with another triumph at the first possible opportunity.
County won the toss and put Northern Counties in to bat first, claiming their first scalp in the fifth over as Shaun Thomas was caugt on 12 by Toby Hardwick off the bowling of Matt Barron.
Inverness outfit Counties continued to score at a solid pace, though, until Alex Green was caught on 40 by Rhys Morgan off Harry Singh's bowling.
That was where Counties attempted to up their scoring rate, with Richard Smith (60) and David Dugdale (36) adding around 80 for the third wicket.
Once Smith went off 2021 match-winner Renato Belli's bowling – caught by County skipper Graeme Carney – wickets began to fall more regularly.
Only two more Counties batters got into double figures, with Belli and Barron each picking up another scalp alongside Paul Moxon, while two run outs also helped the Ross side's cause.
Still, a target of 191 for victory in a cup final is never an easy task, even more so when both opening batters are back in the pavilion less than a quarter of the way there.
Duncan Scott (10) and Carney (14) could only hope their teammates would bring the trophy back to Strathpeffer, and they would have enjoyed watching what transpired.
Hardwick and Morgan strung together what turned out to be a close to match-winning partnership that was approaching 100 by the time Hardwick had to return to the pavilion having scored 73.
There may well have been some concern when Singh followed suit later that same over, but Morgan (55 not out) was on hand to steer County home alongside Umar Farid – who clinched the win with a huge six.