written by Andy Cornish
Herts Hawks ended up losing 3-15 to a better, and undefeated, Daws Hill Spitfires side this weekend, but there were many positives to take away from the game, with good defence and the Hawks first home run of the year.
The Hawks turned up to the game at Daws Hill with only 9 players, and the ever-present Debra Devine. The pitcher for the Spitfires was Nic Stolz, whose reputation is growing with every game. His fastball and dropping curveball kept Hawks off the board until the third, with Daws hill adding 5 runs over that span. In the third, Andy Cornish, leading off the inning sent a 0-1 pitch towering over the left field wall for the first Hawks homer of the year. In that inning, the Hawks used the momentum to score another 2 runs with John Kjorstad and Paul Auchterlounie crossing the plate.
Solid infield defence by the Hawks kept the score at 5-3 until the 5th. 7 Daws Hill runners crossed home plate in the inning, with only a few errors, finding the holes in the field and a 2-run home run down to right field by left-hander Luis Hernandez. Ilya Dimitrov and Bobby Gould were starting to feel the intensity of the game, both picking up leg injuries. Hawks were not able to come back, and often got fooled by the curveball of Stolz for the rest of the game.
Hawks manager, Andy Cornish, commented “I wanted to come into today and show desire and play hard. We were able to do that in the first 5 innings, but I think that the injuries got to us. I am happy with how the infield played in some very tricky bouncing conditions, but think that we have to work on our hitting. The pitcher was good, but we helped him with swinging at a lot of balls outside the zone. It was always going to be tricky, and to Daws Hill credit, they hit well. I want to focus on the next game, and come out and show how we can hit.”