Ferguslie rounded off a brilliant season by winning the Premier League Grand Final on Saturday.
The Meikleriggs men from the Western Premier League, who had already won two trophies in 2022, defeated Eastern Premier League side Heriot’s by 104 runs at Uddingston’s Bothwell Castle Policies ground.
Their skipper Riyaad Henry became the first person to get his hands on the new Willie Morton Memorial Trophy and afterwards he said: “Saturday was great, we knew they were missing a few players but they are still a very strong team.
“We had to bat well and get a score to defend on what was a fairly tricky wicket. All we said when we went to bowl was hit the bails and that’s exactly what our bowlers did, Adil [Ghaffar] set that tone perfectly and we were on top from then.”
Ferguslie batted first as Henry mentioned and Heriot’s took an early scalp when Niall Alexander had David Stafford caught by Durness Mackay-Champion for three.
Opener Ghaffar made 17 and number three Elliot Moses 29, but by the time the latter fell they were 100-4.
They needed someone to anchor the innings in the face of some good bowling by Heriot’s – and Henry was the man to do just that.
He made 68 from 71 balls batting number five, although no one below him in the order made over 14 meaning that the Edinburgh side restricted them to 191 all out after 46.2 overs.
Alexander led the way for Heriot’s with the ball with 3-38 while spinner Ryan Brown took 2-35 and Scotland cap Gavin Main 2-54.
Joe Kinghorn-Gray and James Hickman took one wicket apiece.
Heriot’s were missing batting firepower in the shape of regular skipper Lloyd Brown and Scotland man Matthew Cross and that hindered their run chase in the ‘second half’.
What also hindered their run chase was some excellent bowling from the varied Ferguslie attack who never let them settle.
When stand-in captain Hayes van der Berg was the fourth Heriot’s batter back to the pavilion them were 17-4 and in real trouble.
Ryan Brown and Main both made 14 respectively in the middle order while number nine Ali Farooq top scored with 16, but in the end Heriot’s slumped to 88 all out in just 23.1 overs.
Moses took 4-20, Ghaffar took 2-17, Henry 2-19 and Haroon Tahir 1-11 to get Ferguslie home backed up by some good catching and fielding.
Meanwhile, Meigle will be playing in the Eastern Premier League in 2023 after they defeated Gala in the promotion play-off match on Saturday. At Freuchie Park, 76 from skipper Josh Irvine helped Gala post 192 all out up first, but 90 from Meigle professional Raju Gayashan helped them reach 197-6 in reply to win by four wickets.
