Chawton vs Wield, Sunday 15th May
Wield v Chawton
Weather – Summer (Cloudy, windy & threatening to rain)
Match summary – Another good game with yet another not out for Yorke
A pre-match meeting informed us that we only had 9, 1 phone call at 2pm and by 2.45pm we had eleven. Massive thanks to Matt Blackman and his son Aidan.
A lost toss for the Wield skipper and we were asked to field & with what seems to be a new tic-tac this year the oppo’s decided on a 40 over ‘friendly’!!
With the Wield bowling attack looking as toothless as a pensioner at the denture clinic our skipper hurled the ball at Hunt (and as it turned out, this was the only ball he stopped all day) to open the bowling. With Andy opening at the other end the Chawton batsmen found choosing which part of the county to deposit the ball hard work. Robin was replaced by debutant Aidan and very soon after had his wicket, courtesy of a very fine catch from Guy R. Phillip replaced Andy and proceeded to disrupt the local flight paths, apparently he was rewarded with a stumping, however, this was more likely a run out as the batsmen had his pads off and feet up in the pavilion before Max removed the bails!! Aidan claimed his second wicket, clean bowled, to remove Chawton’s decent opener.
Harry B replaced Aidan and was rewarded with two wickets, one bowled, one caught by me (Hunt had the dropped catches book out at one point) at the second attempt. Dave M replaced Phillip and his extra pace earned him a few boundaries, this is where Robin’s fielding took a turn for the worse, as he wasn’t sure which way to turn or when Dave was going to bowl as he walked in the opposite direction to the ball. Hunt’s dropped catch book did get some attention as skipper dropped a sitter (the book was out as the ball was in flight) and Ed, needing some advice from his younger brother, dropped one on the fence. Luckily Max only missed one stumping and conceded 2 byes!! Somehow we bowled Chawton out for 172, with Dave picking up 3 wickets & myself 2.
Wield, replete with teas, took to the crease with the brothers Robinson. Ed was flashing and flaying from the off as usual. Guy was out to an excellent catch at slip with only his second ball faced. This brought me to the crease and after a tentative start found the middle of the bat a few times before Max joined an exclusive list, and cruelly gunned me down LBW for 22 (I should have been LBW a few balls previous). Ed soon followed as did Harry B and with the scoreboard reading 49-4 we were in real trouble.
Yorkey joined Matt at the crease and after showing the previous 4 how to bat started to increase our run rate, both playing classy strokes to some parts of the ground and along it too; most of the time! By halfway we needed 5 an over and with spinners being employed by Chawton this was possible, Andy was rolling back the years and his sleeves as he and Matt could have done less running in a Marathon. With 10 overs left, Wield needing less than 6 an over and the batsmen needing oxygen the chirpy Chawton youth lost their collective voices and realised that the cake walk wasn’t going to happen. The hundred partnership came and went and it was 10 needed off of 6 balls, it wasn’t to be and we fell 2 runs short of an unlikely victory. Matt Blackman and Andy Yorke added an unbeaten 121 (they ran 73 of these), Yorkey finishing 69 not out & Matt 31 not out.
Good game, good game
Dougie Butler
