Crowthorne & Crown Wood Cricket Club

Scorecard

Grouse & Label v Crowthorne & Crown Wood Cricket Club Crowthorne Saturday 1st XI on Sat 03 Sep 2011 at 1:00
Crowthorne & Crown Wood Cricket Club Won by 95 runs

Match report BARRON, KNIGHT & CHALMERS DEMOLISH G&L IN MUST WIN SEASON FINALE

Crows ended a mixed-bag of a season with a resounding victory over Grouse and Label at Bisley Rec. With serious doubts over the pitch availability and suitability in the weeks leading up to the match, Crows turned up not knowing what to expect from a ground that had been deemed unsuitable for cricket just 2 weeks before.

The Crows panel of pitch experts and inspectors trudged out to the middle to find something resembling a reconstruction of the Somme circa 1916. Others compared it to a lunar landscape as the bowlers rubbed their hands with glee and the batsmen made sure they had their lids in their kit bags.

Whilst much deliberation ensued, skipper Pete Northall presided over the toss with opposing skipper Kiran. The bad news was Crows had lost the toss and would be asked to bat on what looked like a low-scoring track.

Fronting up to the new ball and anticipating expensive dental bills on Monday, were regular openers Sheppard and Gopie. However after a couple of overs the initial concerns over the state of the pitch were proven to be unfounded as the track played more like Great Hollands on a good day than Great Hollands on a bad. However Gopie was deceived by a Yorker from the fired-up Sandip who was bowling from the Main Road End. He also accounted for Sheppard who offered a simple caught and bowled chance. Crows were 28/2 and looked like it might be a low scoring pitch after all.

The wicket of Sheppard bought the skipper and Rich Barron together and this pair really began to milk the bowling, picking off 1’s and 2’s interspersed with some powerfully hit boundaries. When on 31 and looking well set for a big score, Northall was betrayed be the pitch and somehow managed to cue-end the ball from round his ankles to be caught by a high catch on the deep square-leg boundary.


Kev Glazier managed to middle one to long-on and was superbly caught and departed for 0, whilst Steve Northall and Mehul Patel didn’t keep the scorers busy for too long. Barron however suffered no such misfortune as he dominated the bowling for an assured 69. He later commented it wasn’t the best 69 he’d had today. At the other end, Mark Knight rediscovered his sparkle from earlier in the season with a cocktail of good shots all around the wicket, to his a well-deserved half-century as he and Barron saw the Crows to maximin batting points as the score ticked on towards 200.

After Barron had perished, it was the turn of the in-form Ross “Sharma” Chalmers to put the G&L attack to the sword. He hit a brisk 32 including some delightfully timed strokes. Crows reached 230 all out and make a mockery of the pre-match concerns over the pitch.

An interesting Tea followed which contained some “blue coloured” sandwiches with unfeasibly thick “slices” of Cheese, some of which were thicker than they were wide. After consuming their own body weight in dairy produce at the interval the Crows took the field all suffering form a “Cheese-rush”

Wily Crows skipper Pete Northall decided to utilize the Old-ball for the commencement of the G&L dig and from the first over, Partridge and Sheppard (a great name for a pub I reckon) caused problems with their own unique brands of bowling. There were 2 big appeal for LBW in the very first over and the Crows could smell a victory almost from the off.

With the scoreboard barely ticking over the G&L openers took on the arm of Steve Northall at Long-on who hurled in to Partridge at the bowlers end who whipped the bails off and claimed the run-out with no sight of the batsman. This however was because the batsman was laying in a heap about half way down the track writhing in agony as if he’d been downed by a wayward slug from the nearby rifle ranges. Luckily the Crows team contains several medical experts so when Mark Knight arrived on the scene to massage the wrong leg altogether, the Grouse batsman knew he was in capable hands.

When this sideshow had ended, The Crows got the game-heads back on and began to plug away at taking the 9 other wickets they needed to secure victory and Division 2 status. Mehul Patel and Pete Northall competed a legitimate run-out to remove Raj then Turbo Terry Charles pegged back the off-stump of the dangerous Sandip for a big fat duck. G&L were rattled and things did not improve for them when the Crows took the new ball.

Rahul tried to take the attack to the Crows but Dan Partridge took a wonder catch at point, “rising like a salmon” to take the ball way over his head off the bowling off Patel and the Crows were in business. At the Main Road end, Ross Chalmers replaced Charles and took a wicket with his very first ball to start the middle-order collapse in earnest. Chalmers demolished the G&L batting line-up with 6 wickets including 3 in 4 balls to put the Crows on the road to victory.

The Victory procession was briefly halted by an interesting last-wicket partnership between Amman and the diminutive Anish who frustrated the Crows for a few overs before Chalmers finally finished things off trapping Amman plumb leg before for an impressive 68. The Crows had pulled off the Great escape and retain their division 2 status for 2012. A stop-start season had ended on a massive high with a convincing victory and puts down a marker for the performance level we should aim for next year.


Ducks: Kevin Glazier; Dan Partridge
Umpire: Alan Brown

Crowthorne & Crown Wood Cricket Club Crowthorne Saturday 1st XI Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 10 wickets
0
230		        
Simon Sheppard ct & bowled Sandip 12
Micky Gopie b Sandip 3
Peter Northall ct ? b. Anish 31 1
Richard Barron ct keeper b. Sandip 69
Kevin Glazier ct ? b. Kiran 0
Steve Northall b Kiran 1 1
Mehul Patel b Anish 7 1 1
Mark Knight lbw Anish 53
Ross Chalmers b Kiran 32
Terry Charles Not Out  3 1
Dan Partridge ct keeper b. Kiran 0 1

Grouse & Label Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Sandip10.0052317.335.20
Pratyush8.022300.002.88
Anish10.0048316.004.80
Kiran7.3041410.255.47
Raj3.001600.005.33
David2.001800.009.00
Dean2.001800.009.00

Grouse & Label Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 9 wickets
0
135 (0.0 overs)		     
Sean Cross Retired Not Out  10
Rahul ct Partridge b. Patel 13
Raj run out (Patel / P Northall) 1
Sandy b Charles 0
Amman lbw Chalmers 68
Kiran ct S Northall b. Chalmers 14
Pratyush ct Patel b. Chalmers 4
Dean b Chalmers 0
David ct Charles b. Chalmers 4
Sudarshan b Chalmers 0
Anish Not Out  0

Crowthorne & Crown Wood Cricket Club Crowthorne Saturday 1st XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Dan Partridge8.014700.005.88
Simon Sheppard3.01700.002.33
Terry Charles4.00717.001.75
Mehul Patel6.0026126.004.33
Ross Chalmers6.412764.504.05