Match Report
Sunday 25 August -v- Earlswood Strollers at Blackheath Wanderers
All good things have to come to an end as our season long unbeaten record was terminated by the Strollers in an exciting 40 over match. Set 162 for victory, we came tantalisingly close, with Spud failing to find the necessary boundary from the final ball of the day. The usual Bank Holiday absenteeism meant debuts for Dougie Craig (definitely our oldest ever player) and also Mark Warrington (supplied from a room of young boys by 'Uncle Chris'). Earlswood won the toss and elected to bat in a forty over game. It was difficult to imagine a worse spell of bowling than Simon's efforts at Edenbridge, but he managed to surpass that complete dross by some margin. Fortunately Timmo was boldly clawing back what Simon was generously giving away and this prevented our hosts from racking up a massive score; quite why he was allowed to complete all of his allotted eight overs is one that only the skipper can answer. The remaining bowling was effective both in stemming the runs and by doing this, bringing about the fall of wickets. Dougie Craig, approaching his 106th year twirled majestically through five overs, finishing with 1-12, but the star turn came from Blind Pugh who returned season best figures of 4-14, proving beyond reasonable doubt that he does have the character to 'bowl at the death'. Gord allowed young Mark to learn from his Uncle and he responded with four respectable overs. We have discovered over the last few season's that Earlswood, whilst not appearing to have a fantastic bowling line-up, do have the ability to set fields to compliment any shortcomings they have. Once again we lost a host of cheap wickets and heaped pressure on the remaining batsmen. Richard accumulated the necessary dozen runs to pass Steve Lewis' record aggregate, but then joined the Skip back in the hutch after an uncharacteristically loose shot. With half the side out for only 34, GT and Spud set about repairing the damage with a stand of 70, which dragged us back in to the match. Unfortunately Glen hit a rather 'limp' shot straight to mid-wicket and Simon was trapped lbw shortly after. Earlswood dropped their field back, making it difficult to score anything other than boundaries or singles and this tactic proved effective in restricting Spud to only eight of the ten runs needed to win from the last over. Having won a couple of games this season from the final ball of the day, we now had to taste defeat, in what was nevertheless an enjoyable game. As Timmo would say – he would far rather lose a tight game by throwing four wides to the boundary than hang on for a boring and meaningless draw.
