Queensland 170 and 56 for 1 need 392 more to beat Western Australia 310 and 307 for 7 dec (Inglis 136*)
Chasing a mammoth 448 for victory, Queensland will resume play on the final day at 56 for 1. WA took a 140-run first-innings lead after rolling Queensland for 170 on Saturday. But WA were looking wobbly at 58 for 4 in their second innings on Sunday before Inglis took control. He combined with D’Arcy Short for a 124-run stand to help lift WA to a declaration.
Inglis, who scored 47 in WA’s first-innings 310, was happy with how he performed in his first Shield hit-out of the season.
“I haven’t played much red-ball cricket, but to come back and have an impact and help the team to be a really good position, I’m happy,” Inglis said. “We’re in a good position. I probably would have liked one or two more [wickets] tonight, but their guys played well.
“I think there’s still a bit in it [the wicket]. There’s plenty of divots out there on both sides of the wicket, and plenty of bounce and spin for Rocchiccioli as well. I think if we put the ball in good areas tomorrow, we’ll get another nine chances.”
WA’s top four put up little resistance as Cameron Bancroft, Sam Whiteman, Jayden Goodwin and Hilton Cartwright fell before the 25-over mark.
Cartwright batted despite injuring a finger during the team’s warm-up a day earlier. It’s not yet known how serious the injury is.
WA tailenders Joel Paris and Cameron Gannon added some handy late runs to ably support Inglis, who cracked 17 fours and one six.
WA will rise to second on the ladder if they can beat Queensland and Victoria are defeated by Tasmania. Victoria enter the final day of their match in Tasmania needing 69 more runs for victory but with only two wickets in hand.
Queensland, fifth on the ladder, haven’t given up hope of pulling off what would be a famous victory against WA.
“I think the wicket’s in a pretty good spot,” Jimmy Peirson said. “There’s a little bit there when you hit the right area. But when the ball gets softer, we saw today with the way Ingo batted, you can get in there and score runs. It’s left us a big total to chase down, but stranger things have happened.”
