Saturday 3rd
May
Thoresby
Colliery II 135 for 9 (46 overs) [9 points]
Anston II
59 for 5 [10 points]
A late
withdrawal by Rossy enforced Jeppo’s promotion to first team duty and the
inclusion of Lee Willis, thereby plummeting the average age of the team by a
good 5 years to 52½.
Mystery man
Rob Walker refused to reveal the outcome of the toss, but we batted, and Evans
and Halfpenny strode to the wicket. The latter stormed back about 7 minutes
later, first of all having ducked a beamer from the young opening bowler, then
having flicked at a wide one outside off stump to be caught behind for 2. Evans
and Case repeated their efforts of last week, staving off a useful attack
whilst preserving wickets.
As the
weather worsened and drizzle began to fall, Mick was unfortunate to be run out
taking a single when the fielder had only one stump to aim at. Woody looked
reasonably comfortable before playing round a straight one. Mitch had a few
swishes (or were they swafts?) but then tried to pull a yorker. At 68 for 4
with only 15 overs left, play was halted by the umpires as the precipitation
became more persistent. Tea was eventually taken, just in time for many of the
first team to return from their blitzing of N.Wheatley.
Luckily
things brightened up sufficiently to resume.
Stuart, and
newcomer Alan Wilkinson, struck a few boundaries before Evans was cruelly LBW
to one that grubbed at him. Wilks then continued on, with some support from Rob
Walker, but was undone by good field placing when he was caught at deepish
square leg. As the overs declined
One cause
for concern was the young opening bowler who, on his return, completely lost
his length and bowled a series of beamers and high full tosses. We did score
heavily off him at this point but surely the umpire should have removed him
from the attack ….. if only for his own safety, because if he’d bowled a beamer
at Lee Willis with dad Stevie looking on it could have been the end of a brief
bowling career!
The minutes
lost due to rain had already turned this into a ‘time’ game and at the outset
Anston might well have been favourites. But accurate bowling from opening pair
Hutchison and Evans made scoring difficult in the gathering gloom. Stuart
nipped one away from the tall lad and had him caught off the shoulder of the
bat at gully by Mitch. The no.3 obviously wasn’t up for it and Stu had him LBW
after two balls of his next over.
Another
rain delay (the covers were on and off more than Billy’s moustache!) saw the
balance of power tip towards Thoresby as, with 17 overs now left to bowl, Anston couldn’t really win and we were in the
ascendancy. Opener Snee stuck around well, playing a couple of nice forcing
shots off the back foot, but was eventually bowled leg stump by Huggy.
As Robbie
switched the bowlers around Billy, Brian and Lee all had a go, Woody ending up
with 2 for 6. Play eventually ceased round about 8pm with everyone cold and
damp but reasonably cheerful, until Dave Evans resumed his Leonard Rossiter
Monologues. I’m not sure that “Do you like Rising Damp, love?” is one of your
best chat up lines, Dave!
An improvement on last week’s performance;
we’re starting to come together as a team. The batting is still looking rusty,
save Evans, Case and Walker, but close to 140 is always going to be competitive
enough in Div 6. Anston were certainly a stronger bowling side than batting and
we can use this to our advantage next time. They definitely didn’t seem to be a
point better than us on yesterday’s performance.
Finally,
all credit to the umpires for sticking out a damp game and ensuring a prompt
resumption after each rain break.