Friday 18th June 2004
Meopham v New Ash Green
Friday 18th June 2004
Friendly Match
- 40 Overs per side
Meopham 203-8 (40 overs)
New Ash Green 205-6 (37.5 overs)
New Ash Green won by 4 wickets.
This year’s visit to Meopham turned out
to be not just the climax to Meopham Cricket Week,
but its entirety as Meopham had apparently not been
able to raise sides for the other games. Indeed they were struggling to produce
a side for the start of this match, so Andy Stuart volunteered to field first,
partly to maintain NAG’s Meopham
cricket week traditions and partly so that his wicket-keeping skills couldn’t
be blamed for giving the game away.
Simon Duke opened the bowling with Keir
Wilson, each starting with a maiden. Indeed Duke conceded only one scoring shot
in his first four overs, though that was a six, a
shot from Andrew Powney that got Meopham
off the mark on the eighteenth ball of the innings. Powney
continued to play an odd mixture of shots, often looking insecure in defence,
yet hitting enormously powerful shots when he did open up, including a number
of sixes. Although wickets fell fairly steadily at the other end, with Chris Yue taking 2-33 in 7 overs, and Keir Wilson and Steve Ball taking one each and a run out
(without facing a ball) Powney’s potential for big
hitting meant that a big total was still a real prospect. In the end, though,
he perhaps felt he was running out of partners and became more restrained
towards the end of the innings when he had looked as if he might really take
the bowling apart, and eventually he fell to Blair Wilson for 94. Bowling at
the death Blair took 3-32, while Duke came back to bowl the final two overs at the other end in search of his first wicket of the
season. He thought he had succeeded when he took the edge of Denis Smart’s bat and the ball was flying straight to slip at a
comfortable height, but to his horror the diving form of Andy Stuart
intervened, tipping the ball around the slip. To add insult to injury despite
the thick glance Stuart had got on the ball it flew over the lightening fast
outfield for 4. Duke ended with figures of 8-3-27-0, and Meopham managed to take their final total just past 200,
leaving New Ash Green their traditional target for this game.
New Ash Green have been improving their
chasing ability this season, and the common factor in all of their chases has
been a solid start. Rob Jansen and Matthew Quantrill
had provided such a start against Walmer II, and were
looking to do so again, but the very first ball beat Jansen’s bat. There was a
sound and the whole Meopham side went up in
celebration, but the umpire was unmoved. As the non-striking batsman I have to
say that I think he was quite correctly unmoved – the sound seemed to come
after the ball had passed the bat, but unfortunately this incident did sour the
game for a while. After that the first wicket partnership went much more
smoothly, though Jansen continued to struggle to get the ball away. Quantrill was enjoying the fast and small outfield, which
was turning his usual glances and nudges into boundaries, and after a solid
start he accelerated towards the half way stage with a series of boundaries,
hitting Powney out of the attack as both seam bowler
and spinner. The partnership had realised 112 in the 24th over
before Quantrill went for 73, caught at backward
square leg. By now, though, Rob Jansen had begun to time the ball, and
following Quantrill’s departure he upped his scoring
rate, adding 56 in quick time with Andy Stuart for the 2nd wicket,
including greeting the return of the opening bowler with a straight six, a shot
which can’t have pleased the bowler who thought he had got him first ball!
Eventually the bowler got his revenge, bowling Jansen for 64, and from a very
comfortable 168-1 New Ash Green managed to add some tension to the game by
subsiding to 197-6. Andy Cox hit one authoritative 4 before he was bowled by a
shooter, Matt Bushe was beaten by a good ball that
cut back and Andy Stuart (24) and Chris Yue were both
LBW, decisions which restored some of Meopham’s faith
in New Ash Green’s umpiring! With Steve Ball having left to go to work Graham
Hobbs had to be recalled from his early shower to pad up, but he turned out not
to be needed as man-in-form (with the bat) Simon Duke knocked off the winning
runs with two successive fours.
All in all another good game, with both sides
making 200 for the fourth successive year, the chasing side winning on each
occasion. The bad feeling caused by the first ball incident had dissipated
by the end, and we hope to be back for another fixture next year.