Saturday 24th July and Sunday 25th
July 2004
New Ash Green v Old Wilsonians
Saturday 24th July 2004
Kent League
Match - 100 Overs
New Ash Green
(2 points) 88 all out (36.2 overs)
Old Wilsonians (16 points) 89-6 (27 overs)
New Ash Green lost by 4 wickets.
Sunny
weather at last, and New Ash Green won the toss and chose, for a change, to bat
first. This decision was made easier by the fact that two of the opposition
were late arriving on the ground, having had a tour of various Church Roads in
the general area before finding the correct one nearly an hour after the start.
The wicket was a re-used one, but looked firm and bouncy. It certainly proved
to have considerable pace in it, but it wasn't bouncy everywhere. Although
everything came through fairly quickly the height was decidedly uneven. Wilsonians' overseas player, Sri Lankan Hemantha
Alles, certainly enjoyed the pace in the wicket,
quickly building up to a fiery pace. Ben Boss had managed a four at the other
end before he was superbly caught at slip trying to run one down towards third
man, and Andy Stuart, playing as a specialist batsman due to injury, was
similarly brilliantly caught when he could only get the shoulder of the bat
onto another quick delivery. Andy Payne lasted a bit longer, indeed he and
Matthew Quantrill put on 20, the highest partnership
of the innings before he was bowled by one cutting back down the hill at pace
from Alles. Quantrill and
Simon Duke also had a reasonable stand, 16, seeing off Alles.
The gentler pace of Lax Kasturiritne should have been
a relief, but Quantrill failed to time a clip on the
leg side and gave a gentle catch to mid wicket for 26. Duke also made 11 but
the middle and lower order sadly couldn't build any sort of score until Micky Sumner swatted a few good shots towards the end,
before the return of Alles brought a swift end to his
innings on 13, the second highest score. Alles ended
with 9.2-3-13-4, but much worse news for New Ash Green were
the figures of 9-4-12-4 recorded by the much gentler Kasturiritne.
New
Ash Green had thought a total over 100 would be defendable, and had they had
their full pace attack available on this wicket they would probably have had a
very good chance of defending 88. However they were missing, for various
reasons, Cox, Meehan and Stuart from their ideal pace attack. In their absence
Vic Mayers opened the bowling. Suffering from a
shoulder strain Vic was trying to bowl within himself,
but this actually had the effect of assisting his rhythm and causing him to
bowl with greater pace than usual. His first four balls to Rob Harris consisted
of a dot, a short one which was top edged for 4 over the wicketkeeper, an even
shorter one which was pulled over square leg for 6 and a well pitched up one
which cut back and bowled Harris! Harris departed, his
4 ball innings was to be Wilsonians 2nd highest
score. The crucial period came in the next partnership, between Wilsonians captain Simon Corrigal
and Narayan. Both Mayers
and Chris Yue at the other end caused all sorts of
problems for the batsmen, but the chances didn't quite fall for New Ash Green,
with balls just going out of fielders reach and batsmen playing and missing.
New Ash Green didn't help themselves by giving away a
number of runs through misfields and byes, which might
in the end have made a critical difference. Corrigal
also played a number of good shots, but Narayan was
completely at sea, so much so that he made only 2 in a partnership of 53 for
the second wicket! Eventually James Hewitt, replacing Yue,
struck to remove Narayan caught in the deep, and from
63-1 Wilsonians made very heavy weather of finishing
off the game. Hewitt struck 3 more times, and Corrigal
was eventually removed by Micky Sumner for a vital
51. Sumner’s next ball, with 4 needed to win, induced an edge which seemed to
be flying to the boundary, but was brilliantly stopped by Andy Payne in the
gully, nearly holding on to the catch. Saving the four meant another 3 overs of torrid batting for Wilsonians,
with Sumner producing extremely hostile bounce, three times nearly decapitating
the batsman. Eventually Wilsonians scraped home with
the aid of a leg bye off the batsman's head which flew down to third man, but
even another 10 for New Ash Green would have made for an interesting finish as
apart from Corrigal no batsman had looked at all
comfortable. That New Ash Green should have ended the game with 3 slips and 3
close catchers attested to the life in the track! Hewitt ended up with 4-18 in
7 overs, and Sumner 1-9 in 5, both contributing to
ensuring that the game was much closer than the league points gained will
reflect.
Click HERE for full scorecard from KCL site
Click HERE for latest league table.
Old Wilsonians II v
New Ash Green II
Saturday 24th July 2004
Kent League
Match - 100 Overs
Old Wilsonians II (20 points) 223-6 (50 overs)
New Ash Green II (3 points) 146 all out (43.3 overs)
New Ash Green lost by 77 runs.
No match report is available, but finally,
almost certainly too late to stave off relegation, new Ash green have started to
field reasonably competitive sides in the 2nd XI. 223 is a
disappointingly high score to conceded, but there seem to have been some good
spells of bowling, Paul Sumner and Matt Scanlan in
particular having economical figures – a contrast to Sumner on tour! Robin
Wills looks to have been expensive, but was bowling at the end and apparently
bowled some very good balls in a short spell of spin, impressing Pete Burke
enough for him to join the chorus of those who think Robin has a future as a
very good spinner.
In reply there seem to have been a number of
starts, but not enough people going on to build an innings. Mention must be
made of a well deserved maiden half century for Matt Scanlan, and good efforts
for 20 and 22 from Rob Wills and Oliver Harding. Sadly the last wicket fell
when just 4 more runs were needed to secure another bonus point, but at least
for the first time in several weeks the 2nd XI seem to have been in
the game.
Click HERE for full scorecard from KCL site.
Click HERE for latest league table.
Sunday July 25th 2004
With many of the club away on tour the club were once again
unable to raise a Sunday XI.