Result: Lost by 4 wickets.

Report:

The Stragglers side arrived at Ranelagh Gardens to be greeted by grey skies and a rock hard pitch that had more than a touch of green on it. It was therefore of little surprise to the Straggler’s captain when he lost the toss that the Stragglers were duly invited to bat.

Initially all seemed well as despite its greenness the pitch remained true and the ball did not swing allowing the two openers, Graham Grace, a guest courtesy of Sye’s connections with Wimbledon and Tim Carter to settle down and make batting look easy until Tim needlessly ran himself out looking for a single that was never there. Ian Salter after a difficult early period against the moving ball settled down and was starting to flourish and he and Graham put on 56 for the second wicket at better than a run a ball until he played over the top of one from Ed Salt to be bowled for 28. This precipitated a wobble amongst the middle order with wickets falling regularly at one end while Graham carried on batting with unruffled serenity to reach his century on the stroke of lunch. Unfortunately, the usual excellent lunch on offer at the Hurlingham did little to calm the batsmen or perhaps it over stimulated the umpires as Graham found himself to be adjudged LBW the first over after the interval to leave the Stragglers teetering precariously on 177-7. However a blend of limpet like resistance from Sye and a hurricane of shots from Darren Hooey put on 54 in 48 deliveries before Sye became Kennedy’s fifth victim of the innings. This did nothing to blunt the onslaught that Darren was unleashing at the other end; his 50 coming in just 35 minutes off 33 balls and when he was the last man out, cleaned up by Stanton in an attempt to put a delivery into the stream, he had scored 80 off 50 balls in 50 minutes to take the Stragglers to 276 all out which at least gave the bowlers something to defend even if historically it was a slightly below par score for the lightning quick Hurlingham outfield.

Emboldened by his heroics with the bat and with the ground now bathed in sunshine, Darren took the new ball and proceeded to bowl a lively if unlucky opening spell while at the other end, Rory Lavery bowled a consistently accurate length that made scoring difficult and it was he who made the break through inducing Logan to sky a delivery to Swift. The introduction of spin put further pressure on the Hurlingham run rate and when Paul Swift (another guest courtesy of Wimbledon) bowled the Hurlingham captain for a tortuous 19 ball duck, the Hurlingham were 69-3 from 22 overs. However Cripps now joined by Talbot-Williams first rebuilt and then accelerated the Hurlingham innings in exemplary fashion so that by the start of the final hour the Hurlingham needed less than 4 runs an over and still had 7 wickets in hand. Although Stragglers picked up three wickets in the space of 6 overs, the run rate did not slacken and Fletcher duly hit the winning runs with some 7 overs of play remaining bringing to an end a hard fought and enjoyable match where the intensity on the pitch was matched by the warm camaraderie between the sides in the Rose Garden afterwards.

Team Batting First: Stragglers of Asia

 

Batsman How Out Bowler Score
1 G Grace (g) LBW J Kennedy 101
2 T Carter RUN OUT (J Kennedy) 22
3 I Salter + Bowled E Salt 28
4 R Lavery ct O Logan G Burdon 0
5 A Asher ct 0 Logan J Kennedy 1
6 P Swift Bowled J Kennedy 14
7 S Waymouth LBW J Kennedy 0
8 S Razvi * Bowled J Kennedy 10
9 D Hooey Bowled J Stanton 80
10 A Drummond LBW J Stanton 3
11

 

R Pollock-Hill NOT OUT 6
Extras: 11 TOTAL: 276 all out

 

Bowler Overs Maidens Runs Wickets
E Salt 11 1 53 1
J Stanton 9.2 1 53 2
G Burdon 5 0 50 1
J Kennedy 12 3 81 5
S Chapman 8 2 34 0

 

Team Batting Second: Hurlingham

Batsman How Out Bowler Score
1 R Cripps NOT OUT 130
2 O Logan + Ct P Swift R Lavery 2
3 A Kidwell LBW R Polloc-Hill 17
4 S Chapman Bowled P Swift 0
5 S Talbot-Williams Bowled R Lavery 67
6 G Burdon Ct D Hooey R Pollock-Hill 25
7 S Rolls Bowled R Pollock-Hill 4
8 C Fletcher NOT OUT 16
9 J Kennedy* DID NOT BAT
10 E Salt
11 J Stanton
Extras: 18 TOTAL: 277 for 6

 

Bowler Overs Maidens Runs Wickets
D Hooey 7 0 29 0
R Lavery 14 2 60 2
R Pollock-Hill 17.5 4 77 3
P Swift 5 0 36 1
S Waymouth 5 0 20 0
A Drummond 8 0 43 0