Wickford 4th XI game 21st May.

Still no game at home for either me or Joe and Joe wasn't playing this week because he was on a Duke of Edinburgh award walk. So I was off to Wickford's memorial park ground...

I had to scam a lift off of Tony Harms and we arrived at dull cloudy day with the wind quite blustery from the top end of this image to the bottom end 'River Crouch end". I'll refer to the north end as 'The Pavilion End'. I was hoping to take some photo's of the team and other players for a photography project that I'm doing, but no knowing this team and where the pavilion was going to be (I'd got in the car not actually knowing we were off to this ground) I've left it till next week when Joe will be able to help me.

Tony and me were the first ones there apart from their players and it soon became apparent that the building in this image which is currently being refurbed was out of bounds and that there was no pavilion other than the one across the other side of another field 400 yards away.

Our players started to show up and it soon became apparent that we were probably going to be 3 men down with some of them not letting Dutton know it seemed, he wasn't that happy. What made it worse all over the ground we were going to play on there seemed to be the wrong team e.g. what looked like a group of athletic 17-20 year olds - 3rd of 2nd XI type players. Then a couple of older blokes turned up. It then began to sink in... this was the opposition... Nine big youths and two older blokes and these were relatively young too 40's? Whereas we had 8 players...Dutton and Tony in their 40's, me wrong end of my 50's then Gopal and Jay in their 20's early 30's. The rest were small boys all 13 years old. So a bit of an ask for us.

We walked over to the pavilion and got changed, talked about the batting order and I volunteered to open with Tony. Dutton had won the toss and oddly had decided to bat first, I think he was annoyed that we'd been let down by the blokes that hadn't shown up - leaving us in a hopeless situation, so opted to get it over and done with?

Their bowling was okay, nothing like facing Joe or spin and as a result I managed to last 10 or more overs and scored 6 including a 4 flicked off my pads down to fine leg. But eventually a straight one got me through the gate. Jay put a few more runs on the board and then there was a bit of a collapse until Dutton and Travis added a few at the end. There were quite a few extras and in the end we ended up with 77. Travis it must be said looked exceptionally confident with the bat, I reckon he's likely to score 50 at some point this season if he puts his mind to it.

With such a reduced team, not only is it difficult to make a game of it, but it then means we're short of umpires and scorers, so we struggled with that as well. Sam Goods Dad helped out with umpiring which saved us a bit, it would have been good if he could have played as well, maybe next time? Next time we play with a full team I'm going to try and get one of the kids to learn how to score, I always have a spare score sheet with me so there's no reason why one of them if not more shouldn't.

Similarly I'm going to see if I can get Joe to do it, he knows a lot of it, but needs to do it more and get better at it.

It ended up with us scoring 77 with extras added. We didn't bother with tea as it was no-where near tea, we'd only just had drinks at 23 overs when the last wicket fell at about 26 overs.

So out come their openers ex B&PCC player Jodie Reynolds and L.Keeley. With massive gaps in the field and only 77 to score, coupled with a team that looked like a 2nd or 3rd XI team V's a bunch of old blokes and small boys it was a lost cause. Dutton gave most of use a bowl, none of us come anywhere near threatening to get a wicket and both of the batsmen came away with not outs. Jodie Reynolds had a good knock dealing in fours primarily... 38 not out and his mate with 24 not out.

I didn't bowl anywhere near as good in comparison with last week. I chose to have the wind behind me which seemed to be a mistake as it meant I ended up bowling a no-ball and a couple of full tosses that went for 4. I bowled from the Pavilion end...

In the last few days it's rained a little and as you can see it's pretty green. The bounce was variable especially at the 'River Crouch' end Which I was bowling to, but this was found on a good length rather than at a full length which I was looking to bowl to. The other end 'Pavilion End' it tended to bounce a lot less and was more consistent. It turned a little, but to be honest I only bowled 3 overs and didn't bowl that well. There was some turn, but only average. I came away with 3-0-19-0.

Spin check. This in my on going tally of spinners that I play with in our team and oppositions. I've been doing it in a particular way so far and from now on I'm just going to name them and identify their teams. Today they only had one spinner a bloke that lives right near the Rec and yet he plays for bloody Wickford!!! Guess what kind of spinner he was? Yep you guessed it he was a finger spinner. In the conversation I had with him and the captain they were trying to tell me about all the spinners in the adjacent game a few hundred yards away... all finger spinners, but I had to say, no they don't count I have to play in the game with them to count them.

Wrist Spinners -

1. Anonymous Chelmsford CC 3rd XI
2. Dave Thompson. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI

Wrist & Finger combined

Chris Debond. Basildon & Pitsea CC 3rd XI

Finger Spinners

1. Lee Dutton. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI
2. Joe Thompson. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI
3. Alistair Hayton. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI
4. Luke Daw. Basildon & Pitsea CC 1st XI
5. Brandon DeBond. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI
6. Farhan Malik. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI
7. Brian Waterman. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI
8. Kalai selven Kali. Basildon & Pitsea CC 4th XI  
9. 'Don' Wickford CC 4th XI
10. J.Elliott - Leigh-On-Sea CC 3rd XI
11. H.Jeddy - Leigh-On-Sea CC 3rd XI
12. Anonymous Bloke. Basildon & Pitsea CC 3rd XI

With Joe not playing today and me not taking any wickets the situation between us is now...

Me 17-0-71-3 Strike Rate 23.7

Joe 26-2-65-4 Strike Rate 16.3

 Another view of the 4th XI Wicket - Wickford CC - Memorial Park

The pavilion at the Wickford Memorial Park. I'll add this to my photography project here which is a typology of cricket pavilions. This one used to be a lot uglier and more interesting with metal security doors, but it's been converted into a community café and doubles up as a pavilion too.

It was massively disappointing to play in a team of 8 players against a far superior team. Next week we'll be at Langdon hills, so I'll be able to shoot the pictures I've been trying to do now for the last 3 weeks and Joe will be back. Additionally over the week I'm going to try and get in touch with my mate Keith who lives over that way and bats a bit. He's had trouble with his knees or hips for years, but recently has had them fixed and has said in the last month or so, he'd be interested in playing. He'd be able to field in the slips, but his strength is he bats, oh yeah he's a finger spinner as well!

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B&PCC 4th XI v Belhus cc 5th Sept 2015

B&PCC 4th XI v Belhus cc 5th Sept 2015

This was always going to be a good game, we like Belhus, they're great bunch of blokes who play the game in the right spirit. This was the last game of the season, they were mid table of the league and safe in their position and we were at the bottom heading for a league below. To be honest this league for the last two years was always a league too far and we only just scraped into it this year through some weird process that I don't actually recall, but we should have gone down last year. So this year we've had a season of games where we were mullered most of the time. We won one game - don't know how and again as with last year it was while we were on holiday?

Leading up to the game with weather as usual was bad - NW winds, heavy rain mid-week, temperature in the 18 degree centigrade region. Friday it stayed dry and it was a bit breezy, so a chance for the wicket to dry out. Saturday morning which was forecast to be sunny with blue sky, ended up being grey with drizzle every now and then.

The good news was that both sons were playing - so Ben played his 2nd game this season.

Dutton had a plan if he won the toss - we'd bowl first - the wicket was wet and grassy and they had a plan too if they won the toss - they'd bat, so they didn't even bother to toss. Dutton had a plan - we were all going to bowl in 4 over spells irrespective of what happened.

Harry Davie and Joe Thompson both bowled from this end (Estate End).

So, on a very damp wicket under leaden skies younger son Joe was set the task of getting their batsmen back in the sheds. He's our opener (14 years old). His older brother Ben (17) who's not played cricket now for a while because he's got himself a "Silvirkrin" played for only the 2nd time this season and so had to bowl 2nd change.
Joe and Liam Harms got off to a good start, Liam especially...


Liam Harms left hand medium fast - Joe Thompson right hand medium fast.



With two wickets for 2 runs off of his first spell of 4 overs 4-2-2-2 one of the maidens being a wicket maiden. Joe was struggling at the other end with new cricket shoes, but still kept it tight going for 4-2-5-0 at the end of the 8th over only seven runs had been conceded which we needed desperately to be the case as we once again had no batting of any real significance other than John Bedford with potential in the form of Lee Dutton and Tony Harms.

1st change brought on older son Ben and Harry Davie. Harry was first up from the Estate End and bowled a superb four overs for only 3 runs including 2 maidens... 4-2-3-0 keeping us very much in the game. Ben coming in not having played any cricket for months went for more... 4-0-13-0, but that still left us in a very good position with the Belhus run rate kept at a ridiculously low rate with only 24 runs made after 16 overs.

Then Dutton got himself and me into the action with me bowling from the Estate End. Dutton speculated that they were giving the younger players a go up front and as the batting went on we'd see the better ones come through with 3 down care of Liam me and Lee were confronted by the first of the better batsmen it seemed. Not that good a situation when this was the first instance where I'd be rolling out my new approach to the crease .

Apart from a couple of wides I did okay coming away with 4-1-4-0 off my first spell. Dutton at the other end with his Finger spin went for more runs but came away with wickets... 4-1-13-2, so despite the fact that we'd gone to slow bowlers the run rate was still low giving us a glimmer of hope, but we knew they had a lot more in the locker including their bloke who we call 'Sidebottom'.

The Sidebottom bloke didn't get to bat that much in the end, but Ruck, Sullivan and Wilson all made valuable contributions that got their score moving towards one whereby we'd struggle to chase it down. Ben Took a wicket hitting Rucks off stump and he was well chuffed as this was the only game this season that he's bowled in. Liam took the wicket of Long (Sidebottom) which was a result because he can hit the ball over the boundary here at Langdon hills for sixes.

But Joe and Liam came back on at the end and both bowled tightly and managed to keep the score respectable.

We then had a lovely tea and came back on to the field to chase 144. With John Bedford, Lee Dutton, Tony Harms and Nick Brown in the team, assisted by Steve Bonnett, there was a chance that this might be do-able. All we had to do was somehow negotiate R.Long (AKA Ryan Sidebottom).

It didn't happen...



I batted at 11 as usual, but went out with positive intent and hit three fours and a single and was looking to go on to beat my all time highest score of 16. But Squires had other ideas and got Ben's wicket caught again by that bloke Long who'd already taken 6 wickets with his bowling and now finished us off with a catch curtailing any chance of me setting a new PB.

Steve Bonnett batted well scoring the highest score with 31 and I came in 2nd with 13 runs.

Despite losing and being cleaned up by R.Long it had been a very good game which it always is with the Belhus boys. Ben enjoyed it despite the loss and hopefully next year he'll play more frequently?  This game being another loss meant that all season we'd won only one game so we'll be moving out of this league back down to a level we might win a few games in! I for one will be looking forward to that, especially as the wickets are often a little ropey and spin friendly.

 

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