2s defeated at Penshurst

Coin toss, unusually, was won by Tim Croom, who elected for Bearsted to make first use of the wicket at Penshurst. A picturesque ground, overlooking Penshurst Place.

Helen Turner took the book, while Croom and Tim Lush opened the innings. Croom (20) was first to go, bowled whilst caught in two minds as to where to hit a long hop. Richard Luxton came and went before Tim Lush (15) holed out, leaving Chris Filmer and Simon Barker to steady the innings. Filmer cut his way to 46 before he was bowled. Sam Luxton (13) and Steve Horrocks (12) both looked comfortable and helped Barker move the score towards the 200 mark. Simon Barker (61) got to his deserved half century, but when he was out with the score at 183, the innings collapsed to 195 all out in the 39th over. A competitive total, but if felt 20 runs light.

Every bowling and field change made by the home side appeared to be by a committee of nine captains, with a number of split decisions causing considerable debate and infighting in the ranks.

After tea, they appeared to be a more cohesive unit and focused their attentions towards Bearsted.

The innings was played out in a less than satisfactory manner as the Penshurst opener and umpire played their part early on in ensuring that this mid table division six match was played as though it was a matter of life and death, and the result at any cost was what mattered most. Ben Lush bowled excellent for no reward. Jack Feehan was also credited with no reward in the scorebook. Steve Horrocks (2-45), Chris Filmer (1-38) and Leo Charlton (1-17) all bowled well, and backed up by a good fielding performance it took the home side until the 40th over to get the winning run. (Note: you can’t run a 3 when the scores are tied)

Saturday afternoon was summed up for Bearsted with Leo Charlton’s first delivery. Having concluded early in the innings that “we will get nothing given from this lot, we will have to bowl them to get a wicket”, the ball from Leo was chopped towards the stumps, bounced on top of the stumps, but left the bails in place!