2s lose away at Pembury

Same opponent two weeks in a row, and amazingly the same result at the toss, with Tim Croom again having the option. On a wet track (but probably the correct one), the home side were invited to bat.

Jack Feehan (1-26) and Harry Slevin (1-32) again opened the bowling with typically tight and accurate spells, restricting Pembury to 25-1 in the opening 10 overs. As the track dried out, batting got easier. After a wicket in the 3rd over to a fine catch by Simon Barker, Bearsted had to wait until the 36th over before their second and final wicket.

Bearsted were hampered by injuries to their bowlers, with Steve Horrocks only getting through 3 overs, Martin Daly leaving the field to ice his hand and Ian Gutteridge announcing in the warm-up that he probably shouldn’t bowl this week, but “thats OK, you’ve got plenty of bowling!”

The bowlers all stuck to the task, but despite some excellent ground fielding (particularly from Ben Lush) the catching across the team was poor. To steal a phrase from Barry, it was “raggy taggy”.

Despite all that, a target of 189 for victory seemed within reach on a smallish ground and a drying wicket.

Tim Croom and Tim Lush restored their opening partnership and had progressed the score quickly to 29, before Lush (3) was the victim of the first of three excellent catches, the sort that shouldn’t really be seen in division 7, this one being low, one handed and to the left hand of first slip. Croom (24) and Martin Daly moved the score to 49 when Croom made the mistake of being hit on the pad against a home umpire. The umpire almost appeared to lead the appeal and had given his decision before considering whether the ball would have hit the stumps. Or indeed a second or third set of stumps down the leg side.

Daly (28) and Chris Filmer appeared to be taking control before Daly was the second to fall to an excellent catch, this time in the covers. Simon Barker (0) came and went before Steve Horrocks joined Filmer, to again raise hopes. Filmer (27) was the next man out, before Feehan (1) fell to the third excellent catch, a running tumbling effort at fine leg after some sort of reverse scoop/sweep shot. When Horrocks (41) was finally out trying to keep up with the run-rate, the realistic chances of victory had gone. Ian Gutteridge (20*) and Ben Lush (5*) got Bearsted to 176/7 in the 40 overs, but it was not quite enough.

A disappointing couple of weeks, where an extra 15 runs scored or saved in the field would have probably won both games. As it is, Bearsted slip to 3rd in the table, with 3 league games to go. Still in the promotion places, but with work to be done.