No Shortage Of Drama In Irish Senior Cup Quarter Finals

Ruan Pretorious created Irish Senior Cup history by clubbing 6 sixes in an over as Waringstown beat 2013 winners Clontarf in a thrilling encounter at Castle Avenue.

Pretorious scored an unbeaten 101 from just 49 balls - his second fofty coming in just 14 balls.

Conor D'Arcy was the unfortunate bowler as Pretorius and and Greg Thompson (66*) shared an unbroken 6th wicket stand of 164 in 14 overs - 93 of which came off the last 24 deliveries of the innings as the NCU side finished on 316 for 5.

Clontarf were undaunted by the large target and for much of the chase were on course to overhaul it. Bill Coghlan top scored with 94 and skipper Eoghan Delany hit an unbeaten 85 as they fell an agonising six runs short.

CSNI made it an NCU double with a four wicket win at Rathmines against Leinster. Jason van der Merwe took four wickets as Leinster scored 228 for 9 - Joe Carroll top scoring with 48.

Professional Mansoor Amjad shared stands of 88 with Andrew Cowden (33) and 89 with Shane Getkate (41) as he top scored with a fluent 84 off 91 balls (10 fours, 2 sixes) to guide his side to the semi-finals despite the best efforts of Carroll (4-42).

Merrion were the day's biggest winners as they defeated North County by 132 runs at Balrothery.

Tyrone Kane blitzed 11 fours and 7 sixes in a hard-hit 107 from just 90 balls as Merrion ran up 312. Tom Stanton made an entertaining unbeaten 45 at number ten, and followed this up with 4 for 34 as County fell well short.

West Indian Test player Brenton Parchment struck a 52 ball 70, but five times winners County were dismissed for 180.

Pembroke made it through against Malahide at the Village thanks to a fine spell from professional Jonno Cook. He took 4 for 6 as chasing 198, Malahide collapsed from 142 for 6 to lose theor last four wickets for no runs in the space of five balls.

Robin Kelly scored a vital 59 for Pembroke as they recovered from 100 for 7 to reach 198. Kelly shared an 8th wicket stand of 79 with Paul Lawson (23) which was to prove decisive in the final analysis.

In the National Cup, Rush beat Derriaghy by 6 wickets in a high scoring affair, while Dundrum overcame the challenge of Ballaghaderreen.

Drummond beat Laois by 46 runs, while Greg Lambert's six wicket haul helped Greystones to an 81 run win against Newbuildings.

The semi-final draw details will be announced by Cricket Ireland in the coming week.

IRISH SENIOR CUP

At Castle Avenue, Waringstown beat Clontarf by 6 runs
Waringstown 316/5 (R Pretorius 101*, G Thompson 66*, A Dennison 55, L Nelson 35, J Morrissey 2-30)
Clontarf 310/9 (B Coghlan 94, E Delany 85*, R Forrest 60, G Kidd 3-59, K McCallan 2-39, G Thompson 2-51)

At Rathmines, CSNI beat Leinster by 4 wickets