Southwick Wanderers Cricket Club

Sunday 21st September 2008

At last the weather was in our favour. The late Summer sun was surely shining as the Wanderers recorded yet another impressive win. If we can avoid defeat against Brighton and Hove Crescent next Sunday, that will be the first time in recent history, that we would have negotiated a full season without tasting defeat (excluding Tour matches). Even though we've lost 6 matches to the weather, that would still be an impressive feat.

Back to the match. Salthill decided to bowl on their Artifical wicket in a 35 over a side match limited to 7 overs max per bowler. There were lots of decent contributions with the bat, Dave and Ian W getting in the low 20s, Jez registering a very impressive 36 before getting run out at the non strikers end off a Jamie Hyde straight drive. Jamie himself smacked the ball to all parts for his 59. He was only 'out' after being caught on the long off boundary (the fielder had his foot well behind the boundary marker in taking the catch right in front of the away side!. It later transpired that "home rule" dictate that the boundary is always the fence (which for those that weren't there, was a couple of foot behind the boundary marker). So this all meant that the Wanderers totalled 190 for 7 in their 35 overs. A good, solid batting performance.

Despite the good performance with the bat, Wanderers typically do better batting second, but the no draw option here would surely help. The Salthill openers looked very solid, picking off the rare bad balls from Paul and Jamie as they opened the bowling. Salthill, however, were never able to match the Wanderers scoring rate, and once we had dismissed their no 3 to a great ct & bowled by Mr Field, they never looked like chasing down the score, and we eventually managed to bowl them all out for 100 with over 5 overs to spare. Everyone seemed to chip in with the wickets, but Barry in particular, was extremely effective with his wicked spin. Our fielding also included a memorable catch by Tony Breslin, who pouched a quick one at chin height and boy was he happy about it! Brilliant stuff.

Once the final wicket went, Paul manfully allowed their 10 year old back out to bat as this had been his first taste of "mens" cricket. Three overs of fun followed in which balls that were destined to hit middle stump were miraculously snaffled in front of the stumps by the keeper (that John fella is really nice isn't he!!). The effort made by the Wanderers to give the chap some cricket certainly seemed to go down well, so much so that there was talk of renewing the fixture for 2009.

All in all, an excellent match. When I manage to get hold of the scorebook, I'll add batting and bowling cards for all recent matches ! Lets see if we can make history next Sunday!