One of the Border’s finest cricketing exports made a return during yesterday’s Border Bash at Lavington Sportsground.
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Dominic Thornely has taken on a role as an assistant coach for Sydney Thunder’s WBBL side and was delighted to be back in his home region as they accounted for Melbourne Stars in the Border Bash.
“It’s great to be back, I caught up with mum and dad last (Monday) night,” Thornely said.
“It’s nice to come home and see how good this facility is, I haven’t been here for years.
“It reminds me a little bit of the Toohey’s Cup that happened here many years ago when I was a kid seeing some of the superstars walk out to play cricket.
“The WBBL goes everywhere, we’re in Wagga, we’re in Canberra, Launceston, Lilac Hill in Perth and there’s Alice Springs games.
“You’ve got to take the game to the people.”
Thornely was a premiership player with East Albury in Cricket Albury-Wodonga before debuting with NSW in 2001.
He scored more than 5000 first class runs and took 54 wickets, having also represented Australia A, but will forever have fond memories of his childhood growing up in Albury.
“I played AFL on this ground for many years with Lavington and had some great memories there,” Thornely said.
“I’ve also watched a lot of AFL games on this ground and played quite a bit of cricket as a kid.
“You never get tired of coming back and I’ll be back for Christmas which is good.”
Thornely took on the role of batting coach for the NSW Blues last season, but requested a change to the women’s environment this year.
“It’s good to understand how the female athlete operates, what they think and how they go about playing the game of cricket,” he said.
“I’m learning so much about the sport by the way women play the game.”
Thornely’s Thunder side took down Melbourne Stars by eight wickets in the opening game of the day.
The Stars could only manage 8-114 from their 20 overs, with the Thunder cruising to the total with more than five overs to spare.
However, the Stars got revenge in the men’s fixture with a nine-run win thanks to a quickfire 34 from import Kevin Pietersen in the total of 9-161.
Thunder reached 8-152 in reply.
A crowd of 6877 attended the second edition of the Border Bash.
Cricket Albury-Wodonga chairman Michael Erdlejac was happy with the final figure, but would like to see Cricket Australia schedule future events on a weekend.