Deerest team mates.
Firstly, the eagle eyed among you will notice we missed a week. For good reason. Let’s save ourselves the ignominy of reliving what happened when Cudham Wyse came to Knole. The scorecard tells enough of the story – 7 ducks (4 golden) and a mere 48 on the board added to dropped catches in the field meant we didn’t manage to score a point on the day. Never again.
Moving on swiftly to last week’s trip to Bitchet Green where we faced up to St Lawrence, a team we’ve played against for many years in the KCVL, meaning Jules knew most of them pretty well. Once again, I was unsuccessful at the coin toss but nevertheless came back with the desired outcome of bowling first. Sometimes you can be so unlucky that you get some luck. And it proved luckier still that the ball was talking for one Sebastian Guterres, who tore through the top order with a raft of in-duckers, which either removed leg stumps or took the edge behind. A wonderfully destructive opening burst (with the customary beamers mixed in for good measure) was supported very well by Ross at the other end – unlucky to remain wicketless on the day considering the unrelenting accuracy of his bowling, Ross bowled 6 overs for only 8 runs. He did find a way into the action soon enough though, with a top drawer catch snaffled running backwards at mid-on, off the bowling of Phil Sheridan. Given the amount of catches we’ve put down in the last few weeks, it was refreshing to see a good chance stick, and the confidence buoyed throughout the team from that point on. The strangling combination of Phil and Brian would go on to drain the life out of the St Lawrence batting line up, offering no free runs and chipping away at the wicket column almost at will. Between them, 12 overs were bowled, 12 runs were scored and 7 wickets were taken, with Phil holding the ball aloft for a return of 5 for 5 off 5.5 – incredible figures indeed. All of this fantastic bowling meant that we had flipped the script from last week’s horror show, and were now in total command at the tea break, left to chase just 40.
Given the fielding innings took just 24 overs, we were almost straight back out to chase the total down. Given Cameron had rejoined us after his incident against Betsham in preseason, he was promoted up the order to accompany Mr Ede to open the batting and get some time in the middle. He wasted no time in showing his intent to put the contest to bed early, with a 6 down the ground followed by a paddle sweep getting the innings off to a strong start. Both openers looked to play aggressively from the off, with enough in our line up to pick up the task should things not go their way. Unfortunately, that was to be the case, with both openers falling shortly after getting us to the halfway point of the chase – Rob nicked one behind to some good full bowling from the opening bowler, while Cam was caught back on his crease against the spinner, LBW bringing an end to an exciting little innings. It also didn’t go George’s way, another nick into the cordon meaning the old guard were brought into the middle to finish the job. Dan looked as assured as ever, picking off the bad balls with a flurry of boundaries, while I was busy jousting with the opening bowling at the other end. He took it too far with a shy at the stumps, and his punishment was me walking down the pitch and sending the ball back over his head to the boundary, where it was lost. RIP that Dukes ball, it was a short and sweet love story. There was no more drama in the chase, as we picked off the remaining few runs with relative ease – game won by 4, in the pub by 4.15. That’s what I’d call a good day’s work.
In terms of awards, our bowling unit should really share the MVP award for this week, but for his astounding figures, Phil Sheridan takes the biscuit – well bowled sir! The TFC award is a tough one again because no one made an arse out of themselves at all. Willy gets a minor mention because he saw almost no action so it’s a very friendly TFC for him this week. Hope to see you back in your whites soon though!
We move on to week 5, back at home, with Fordcombe our opposition for the day. Look forward to finally having some batting (and spin) friendly conditions after the week of proper summer weather we’ve had. See you there and in the meantime – swing true Sennocke.