Waltham
were left rueing missed chances on a damp pitch against
Prestcold (aka the Rosier Clan and Friends) at Binfield
Heath, as the batsmen failed to come close to the challenging
but gettable target that the bowlers had provided.
Waltham Sunday XI captain,
Chris Burge, won the toss and decided to field on a
slightly damp pitch at a ground with two trees in the
outfield. James “Beer Sweat” Woolford and Waqas Tahir
opened the bowling and the former was accurate with
his opening deliveries, including finding an edge that
split slip and gully, while the latter initially struggled
to find line and length. However, within a few overs
each the roles reversed, and some good accurate bowling
finally yielded Waqas the wicket of opener D. Rosier.
Woolford, after a final over that took 11
balls to finish, was replaced by Andy Smith. Smith soon
settled into some accurate off-spin bowling, and offered
chances to several fielders during his opening over,
including a sharp chance to point which Don Rockell
did well to get a hand to, though he couldn’t cling
on. Chris Burge replaced the miserly Waqas and soon
Prestcold batsmen Desbois and King started loosening
their shoulders and upping the run rate. As the partnership
reached 60, opener Desbios offered a chance back to
bowler Smith, who gratefully snatched the catch.
This brought Horne to the crease, who joined King
in expoiting the Waltham attack, with Nath “caught by
a girl” Thomas replacing Burge with little more success.
Smith came to the end of his spell with two well driven
fours off his last over by King, to be replaced with
Chris Sharpe.
Sharpe struggled for consistency
in his early overs, but took the crucial wicket of King
for 41 off a double-bouncer caught by Rockell at cover.
Sharpe found his line and length in his later overs
to persuade two other Prestcold batsmen to send catches
to James Woolford at mid-on, including Horne for 40.
Matt Nebbett bowled the final 5 overs from the opposite
end, and kept runs down (partly thanks to some good
commitment from Ziggy Kiani close to the bat) while
taking the final wicket to fall, that of Hayward, caught
by ‘keeper Dan Owen off a skied top edge.
After 40 overs, Prestcold had managed 176 runs, a competitive
but gettable target that should have been lower had
it not been for a number of missed chances in the field.
Dan “The Cat” Owen and Nath
“caught by a girl” Thomas opened the Waltham reply,
and after allowing both the opening bowlers to get a
maiden under their belts, Thomas started playing his
shots before misreading a slower ball and hoicking the
ball straight to a fielder.
Debutant Naqash
Tahir replaced him at the crease, and, despite some
solid defensive strokes and an alarmingly high backswing,
was soon following Thomas back to the pavilion to be
replaced with Woolford. Owen and Woolford allowed the
run rate to stagnate until, after putting on 23 in 11
overs, Owen offered his ninth and final chance to the
field and returned to the pavilion with Waltham on 32-3.
Ziggy Kiani joined Woolford in the middle
and soon showed that scoring boundaries was possible,
despite the rather long grass in the outfield. Shortly
afterwards Woolford lost the second of his lives (the
first being a plumb lbw that wasn’t given), taking one
step forward too many to Andy Rosier and being stumped
by Prestcold wicketkeeper King.
Kiani soon
followed him, loosing his stumps to Headland, and Rockell
was close behind after taking a desperate second run
that was never there and failing to make his ground.
That brought Matt Nebbett to the crease to join skipper
Chris Burge, and Nebbett quickly got bat on ball to
hit a stunning 4 over midwicket, except one of the two
trees was also over midwicket, so the 4 only counted
as 2.
Nebbett continued to demonstrate how
to up the run rate to the top order, before rushing
bowler Headland and failing to make contact, losing
his stumps in the process. That left Chris Burge to
marshal the tail, and Chris Sharpe and Waqas Tahir made
little contribution before returning to the pavilion.
Andy “5 ducks” Smith performed his normal duty of blocking,
blocking and blocking some more while Burge made his
was to 19, the top score of the day, with two well hit
boundaries. Burge was finally given lbw to spinner D
Rosier to a ball that Hawk Eye might possibly have said
that was going well over the stumps.
Many thanks to Prestcold for
an enjoyable game on a day that hadn’t looked like allowing
much play. Sadly a lack of runs early in the Waltham
innings, and a regular tumble of wickets did not allow
them to get near a competitive total that could have
been lower with some sharper fielding. |