2s lose friendly against Sherwood

It was with much excitement and chatter that the 2019 season opened for the 2nd XI. Admittedly the chatter was all about how ruddy cold it was and why Simon Barker had brought the boundary in over the winter. His defence that the boundary was too long on the clubhouse side was met with some incredulity by his team-mates, especially the bowlers, on what is one of the smallest pitches around.

Sherwood turned up and looked fairly confident, having beaten us easily last and discovering that we only had 10 players. With the exception of Ben Lush the team was packed with age, experience and infirmity.

Skipper Croom, still basking in the glow of Wales’ Grand Slam, resumed from where he left off last year and lost the toss. The opposition chose to bat.

Ben Lush opened the bowling up the hill and hit a good rhythm with the odd bad ball. Gutteridge insisted that with his extra pace he should come down the slope. The pitch looked in pretty good nick.

Gutsy quickly found the opener’s edge. John Savage behind the stumps had been extolling the benefits and grip of his expensive new gloves. Sadly it transpires that modern technology has not reached the stage of moving the gloves into the right position and the chance went down. To be fair to John, his keeping remained consistent all afternoon. Fortunately skipper Croom was in better form and took two early catches.

Unfortunately the third wicket pair played themselves in and albeit with the odd mishit shot and a slightly unusual technique at times, started dispatching the ball around the pitch. The scoring rate increased as the innings went on.
Dave Latter bowled and seemed to go for more leg side boundaries than is usual. Mind you, if the boundary had been in the usual position who knows what his figures may have been.
Tim Lush replaced the fruit of his loins and bowled tidily.

Chris Filmer came down the slope and was perhaps a little unlucky. A shirt pitched ball was despatched by the opposition number 4 to your match reporter at mid wicket. It was travelling at some speed but having moved and got a hand to it it really should have stuck. Your reporter currently has a sore hand and large purple bruise to make sure he does not forget about his drop.
The No 3 retired after a brisk 50. The No 4 reaped the benefits of various missed chances and went to an unbeaten century in the last of the 35 overs.
Sherwood set us a good target of 224 to win.

Champagne moment in the field was the ball rolling slowly towards the rope chased by two fielders. Gutteridge confidently announced “I’ve got it” before managing a Ronaldoesque stepover with his right foot and kicking the ball with his left, sending it over the boundary.

The two Tims opened the batting. The opposition openers were unpleasantly young. A 15 year old girl who bowled sharply and accurately and a 17 year old lad who bowled looping off spin. Croom, who as we all know, likes it up him, promptly fell to the spinner getting a bottom edge onto his stumps.
Lush missed a straight one, possibly beaten for pace by the other opener.
Chris Filmer looked in good nick but played round a straight one.

Barker, possibly confused by the shortened boundaries, quickly looped one up and fell to a good running catch.
The rest of the opposition bowling did not look as useful and we really should have done better. Only Latter hung around and went to a classy looking half century. His reluctance though to run when the ball was within 30 yards of a fielder had the signs of a man wanting to save his legs for the rest of the season. And of course, with our new smaller boundary most of the fielders were within 30 yards of the ball at all times.
It was really good to see Richard Luxton out batting. He looked a little unsure at the beginning but after a while started to show glimpses of his talent. One glorious six flew over the shortened boundary bouncing straight into the clubhouse.

Skinner, possibly confused by the large numbers of wides bowled in the over missed a decent ball and was bowled behind his legs.
Gutteridge saw out the last few overs with Latter but we fell well short.

Another friendly follows at the Green next Saturday before the League season starts.
In other news, the clubhouse is looking in good shape with some new furniture arranged by Simon Barker. It transpires that he has wisely spent the savings he has made on boundary paint.