CAMPERDOWN turned the tide on one of the region's greatest sporting dynasty with an emphatic South West Cricket semi-final victory on Saturday.
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The Lakers, led by Steve Fisher, defeated Mortlake by just one wicket to book a spot in the competition's grand final whilst simultaneously scoring redemption in its first finals appearance since 2011-12.
It will be just the second time since 2010-11 that the Cats, who defeated the Lakers in their last finals appearance, won't feature in the final game of the SWC's season with the first time coming back in 2015-16.
In that time Mortlake secured six division one premierships across the past 10 seasons.
During the same time Camperdown finished fifth, second, eighth, seventh and last twice in division one while also spending three seasons in the second tier.
A five-wicket haul and a final wicket stand from Bernard McLeod, who was playing in just his sixth game of the summer, was critical to Camperdown securing the win over the Cats.
McLeod combined with Nathan Hay (10 not out) to put on 18 runs and help the Lakers crawl over the line in the 37th over.
A 43 from Sri Lankan import Kusan Niranjana was critical to the successful run chase.
The Lakers will face defending champions Pomborneit, who are no stranger to finals after playing in six since 2008-9, after it edged out Noorat in another thrilling finish.
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Two consecutive wickets to Brad Hillman (3-20) halted Noorat's late charge for a dramatic six-run victory.
Tom Place was also a key player making 43 with the bat and taking 2-22 from his six overs to restrict Stephen O'Connor's side to 146.
"It was definitely as close and intense of a game as I've eve been involved in," captain Grant Place said.
The Bulls leader said his side would look to address its batting after four of its batters failed to score a run.
"It's not often you have four guys make ducks and three of them golden and you win, that doesn't happen in too many games," he said.
"That will be our first area we will try to address and probably some fielding also as we dropped some genuine chances in field. We will look at those during the week."
Place was pleased with the way his bowlers were travelling heading into their second straight grand final appearance.
"All the bowlers did a good job as they normally do and we bowled tight early in the first 15-20 overs," he said.
"The run rate was around 2-3 an over and then we put down a chance to get (Jacob) Fishwick and he picked up pace considerably and from then on it got awfully tight."
Place said his side would take plenty of confidence from the narrow victory.
Camperdown and Pomborneit have only played each other once this season with the other game abandoned due to rain. The solitary match was in round five when the Bulls secured a 39-run victory.
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