Energy Exiles Cricket Club

Match Summary: vs. Agricola, Sunday, 23 Jul 2006

Ground: King's House Sports Ground
Captain: Andrew Wingfield
Match type: Time
Toss: Agricola elected to field
Weather: Hot, overcast
Opposition: Agricola scored: 159 for 7 (37 overs)
Exiles Score: 178 for 9 (38 overs)
Result: Match Drawn
Man of the match: John Hodgson 4 for 20

What a day for sport, the sun shinning, clear blue skies for miles around, an excited crowd gathering for promised to be a hard fought contest of sporting giants. Sadly that was Hoylake, back in Chiswick ominous grey clouds filled the sky, a small and sleepy crown gathered for what promised to be an entertaining (not always for the right reasons) contest of sporting … lets say enthusiasts.

As is usual the skipper strode gingerly into the centre, with the look of a man who regretted the last bottle of wine from the night before, to keep his fine run of losing the toss going (won 1 lost 9). To my delight they had put us in bat (in my previous games we had failed to successfully chase a target, even as low as 99 runs and we only had 10 men), this delight was short lived as the strange rules of a timed game were explained to me and Mr Gundry confidently strolled from the pavilion.

So it was simple. All we needed to do was set a reasonable total and bowl them out to win, easy!?! The opening pair started carefully on a pitch that was apparently doing quite a bit, least I think that's what was said, I must admit I was more interested in reading about Newcastle's imminent capture of Damian Duff to give my full attention to the openers brave resilience in taking the shine of the new ball (heard commentators say that at a test match once, hope it's appropriate). After what seemed like an age the shine was off, the pitch had calmed or the bowlers were tied, either way some shots were played waking up this reporter. A couple of fine 4's and things were looking up, then disaster, Bradshaw caught. On went Patel to steady the ship, and after getting his eye in he played some sensational cricket, which spurred Davies on to play some equally great shots, the score board was starting to accelerate at breakneck pace. After a great partnership the oppo finally got them, both wickets falling in reasonably close succession. Surely this would be the perfect solid start to allow Tither and Edwards to play their shots …

Edwards' wild aggressive play, combined with an unusually accurate slower ball signalled the start of a collapse. Will 'I hit the blo*dy ball' Scott showing great restraint when given LBW and Hodgson followed all too quickly. Thankfully while all this was happening Tither was showing stubborn resilience and started to hit some cracking 4's. So things weren't looking great till the so called lower order stepped up to the mark. Gundry did well with a fantastic 16 from 11 balls, Palao on the other hand had decided it was all just too much so removed one of his pads and settled down to a little nap before tea. Normally not such a problem but when time is running out and you're the next to bat, probably not the best of moves. Panic followed bemusement, but thankfully the captain was ever ready to take Palao's place. Unfortunately for Palao, Wingfield's resistance was short lived (2 balls), Palao was told in no uncertain terms to put his pad back on and get out there (bad language removed in case easily offended people are reading this). With Tither having fallen as well It was down to a last stand of Palao and Chamberlain to give the bowlers something to aim for (something else I've heard while watching test cricket …) And what a good job they did notching up 20 runs from 11 balls, giving a total of 178 for 9.

Half the job done, now we just needed to bowl them out.

All started well, the captain leading the way by example bowling one with a brilliant unplayable ball that seemed to forget to bounce and tricking the other into a wild sweep, pull or cut, not fully sure of the names of different shots, but it was wild and the ball sailed high in the air to the grateful hands of Chamberlain, who even gave a bow to his friends and family, sadly they were seemingly more interested in their picnic, a great catch none the less. Unfortunately things didn't progress so well, the oppos number 3 Theoy turned out to be a class above with the bat notching up a sublime 85. At one point victory for Agricola looked a real possibility as they started to score with ease, but thankfully the combination of a mean spell of bowling from Gundry (19 runs from 9 overs), some great wicket taking bowling from Hodgson (4 wickets from 4 overs), a great team performances in the field (despite Tither suffering from groin strain) and the great hands of Phil 'the cat' Chamberlain (3 yes 3 catches) moved victory well out of site.

I'm starting to bore myself now, but mention must be given to the unsportsmanlike conduct of one of the opposition. The ball was skied high back to the bowler Hodgson, having ran one run the batsman chose to shout at the top of his voice 'two' just as John was about to catch the ball. As John was stood by the stumps even if the ball had been dropped there was no way Linford Christie could have made it half way down the track before the bails were removed. The only purpose for this shout was to put John off his catch which simply isn't cricket. Thankfully behaviour like that is few and far between in the beautiful game.

All in all a great day out and a moral victory I feel.

Report By: Chris Edwards

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