Crowthorne & Crown Wood Cricket Club

Division 2

Crowthorne continued their unbeaten start to the season with a four-wicket win over previously unbeaten Waltham St Lawrence.

Waltham batted first on a decent pitch, but lost wickets at regular intervals thanks to tight bowling from Terry Charles and Luke Jouanides.

Charles took 3-36, while 2009 player of the year Jouanides enjoyed yet another five-wicket return for just 36 runs.

Only a last-wicket stand of 50 between Gullalar and Herbert gave the visitors a reasonable total, pushing the score up to 162 before Gullalar was clean bowled by Charles.

Ross Chalmers and Dan Partridge picked up the other wickets in an excellent bowling and fielding display from the Crows.

In reply Crows lost wickets early on before skipper Pete Northall played a typical innings, racing to 43 and handing the initiative back to Crows before being caught at midwicket.

When Ross Chalmers succumbed to an extraordinary catch it was left to bowling heroes Charles and Jouanides to see Crowthorne home and they put on a partnership of 70 with Charles in particular playing some expansive shots.

Jouanides was solid as a rock at the other end scoring 20no and Charles cruised to 56no as Crows reached their target with more than 10 overs to spare.

Skipper Pete Northall said: “This was an excellent win against a good team.

“We were a bit depleted with a couple of the guys playing with injuries and a couple of key players missing, but we put in a great team performance and are happy with the result.

“Terry and Luke got the wickets and runs, but we fielded well as a team and are very pleased, especially as Waltham St Lawrence had won all of their previous matches this season.”