As Rochester Cricket Club writes its opening chapter as a united front, the first club legend future generations will hear about is Dylan Cuttriss.
There is not one player in Goulburn Murray Cricket A-grade you would prefer to have batting to steer the ship after a tough start of 5-42, but the champion player knuckled down with a match-winning 79 against Kyabram Fire Brigade in the weekend’s decider.
If there was any doubt his gutsy innings would earn him the man of the match nod, Cuttriss sealed the accolade with three early wickets, ripping the heart out of Fire Brigade’s batting card.
Together with great mate Tim Rasmussen on day one, the duo put on 105 together to turn a losing position into a winning one — and Cuttriss said the key was not panicking.
‘‘Tim’s one of my best mates; we just tried to remember it was no stress, we’ve been in that position plenty of times before,’’ he said.
‘‘We just wanted to face a lot of balls and whatever happens happens. We were confident once we had a bit of a score that our bowlers would be able to get the job done for us.
‘‘It was pretty special to be able to do what we did and walk off the ground at the end of the weekend with another premiership. It’s really what sport is all about, mateship and getting to share those moments.’’
It took the speedster just two balls to find the opening breakthrough of Justin Elliott and by the time the Flames were 4-12, Cuttriss had 3-10 having sent danger man Marx De Villiers and Ben Langley packing.
‘‘It’s not really a position we’ve ever got into in a grand final, we’ve always had to do it the hard way,’’ he said.
‘‘We were lucky enough to get a couple of early ones and we knew if we could do that we’d be a massive show.’’
He might be getting on in age, but saying Cuttriss is past his prime would be flat-out incorrect; his staggering tally of 40 wickets at 10.73 this season was his highest mark since 2010-11, where he took 40 at 10.5, the only other season he has nabbed 40 scalps.
He said winning for the united club was something he would not forget.
‘‘It was a pretty emotional thing really, bringing those two clubs together and being able to cap it off with a flag,’’ he said.
It’s probably reinvigorated my cricket, I’ve always set pretty high standards for myself and it’s made sure we perform week in, week out.’’