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Great Waltham Cricket Club

Scorecard

Burnham Sports I v Great Waltham Cricket Club 1st XI on Sat 30 Jul 2011 at 1.30pm
Great Waltham Cricket Club Won by two wickets.

Match report Chasing 230 to win, an understrength Waltham crept over the line with six balls to spare to consolidate 2nd place in the T.Rippon Mid-Essex League 1st division table.

In a very evenly-contested match, Burnham responded well after being put in on a green wicket. Returning to the 1st XI fold after a string of storming performances in the 2nd team, Ben Collar removed both opening batsmen Smith (32) & Green (35) after they'd put on 68 for the 1st wicket in fluent fashion.

With the outfield like lightning and Chappy still stuck up a ladder somehwere in Black Notley, covering for the absent 11th player was a real challenge in the strength sapping sun. Again, Ollie Fitz was providing great support at the other end.

The big-hitting Joel Whittaker was quickly removed as he missed out on a low full toss that struck him on the full, slap bang infront of middle stump. Rob Layzell (23) looked dangerous after the captain shelled a hard (but not impossible) low catch, and he was threatening to cash in on this let-off when Chappy entered the attack (after his designated time period) to nip one back to rattle the woodwork. Jalal Ahmed followed soon after as Duggers picked up his 2nd to leave Burnham rocking at 136-5... but still going at just north of 5-an-over.

With dangerman Ali Allchin looking in the mood for some big runs, a useful partnership of 50 runs developed with Robin Whittaker (28) that only ended when 'Cheesy' took his weekly catch in the deep to give Chappy his 2nd victim.

Dominic Whittaker (33) built on the platform with a useful knock that kept the run rate going at 5+ but the removal of Allchin (48) proved the turning point in putting the brake on the Sports innings. Ollie bagging the prized wicket as the captain redeemed himself by snaffling a steepler of a catch with a Jackie Chan-style slide thrown in for good measure. Stephens (1) departed as a great bit of glovework from Blooma gave Chappy his 3rd victim in a marathon spell of bowling that made up for his late arrival. Whittaker was run out off the final ball as the innings closed on 229/9.

A quick mention here for Blooma... the standard of his wicketkeeping was simply exceptional and set the tone for the fielding performance of the whole team. He stood up to every bowler for 44 out of 45 overs, keeping the Burnham batsmen anchored to their crease... you can't underestimate how important this was in keeping the scoring in check.

There was no doubt that our batting line-up had the depth... but did it have the quality to chase down 230?

At 82 for three after 20 overs of their reply – Burnham had amassed 101 at the same stage – we were behind the required run rate and had just lost our key batsman without facing a ball. Swanny clubbed the ball back to bowler Barnes like a bullet... He could only divert it onto the stumps at the non-strikers end as Blooma was run out in bizarre circumstances. Sadly, Barnes sustained a badly dislocated finger in the process as Burnham went down to 10 men and lost their 1st change bowler.

And then Craig Swan "clicked into turbo"...

In a 4th wicket partnership of 70, "the destructive opener took the game away from the home side by thumping eight sixes and eight fours in a match-winning innings of 98". Swanny moved from 50 to 98 in a matter of balls as Green (2 overs for 32) served up some buffet bowling that was dispatched to the midwicket boundary with ease and relish. This wasn't slogging. This was clean hitting. "He'll duff one in a minute" was the call... but the hits just got bigger and cleaner. The 'words of encouragement' from 'spin' bowler Green only fired up the batsman... I can only thank him.

By the 30 over mark we were 154-4. 4 ahead of what Burnham had been at the same stage.

Swan’s dismissal gave Sports renewed hope and they battled back with Ali Allchin (12-2-31-1) and Robin Whittaker (7-0-25-2). But with PA and Duggers still at the crease, we needed 36 from the final five overs with 4 wicket in hand. PA was making it look easy - the highlight of his innings, a beautiful straight drive back past Allchin - and it seemed that these two were going to win it all by themselves until Joel Whittaker removed PA LBW for 39.

201-7 became 208-8 as Chappy departed for 0 and we still required 14 from the final dozen deliveries, with only two wickets left.

Cue the 'Ollie Fitz Gun Show'. Go big or go home.

Ollie sent the 1st delivery of the penultimate over rattling into the corrugated metal of the leisure centre with a big 6 over long-on. The 2nd ball saw a tight single turn into a scrambled 3 as a deflected over-throw saw the equation change to just 5 off 10. What a turnaround.

With the field brought in, Duggers (28*) drove ball No.4 to the midwicket boundary to bring the scores level and the final delivery of the 44th over was crashed through backward point to seal a fine 2 wicket win with an over to spare as "Waltham’s clean-hitting tail-enders snatch(ed) the spoils".

The trip down to Burnham was made more in hope than in expectation but Burnham cracked when 'under the pump' and shelled catches and conceded sloppy runs in the field as the run chase heated up.

5 games to go and the battle for promotion is still wide open. A battle that I never thought we'd be part of at the start of the season. Baddow had a cracking win at home to Stock to keep the pressure on and their encounter with 4th placed Writtle this weekend will be eargerly contested.

Burnham and Stock shouldn't be ruling themselves out just yet either... a run of 5 wins from 5 from either side could see both mount a late charge for the Premier as the respective "run-in's" of the top six teams are studied more than the league table.

Totham continue to set the pace and although their lead is not unassailable, it'd take a sever bout of self-destruction to stop their surge to the title and securing one of the two spots up for grabs.

We just need to focus on Brookweald... and they certainly won't be underestimated as unavailability reaches it's peak.

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Burnham Sports I Batting

Player name		Runs
extras TOTAL :	for 9 wickets	0 229 (0.0 overs)
Green	lbw Collar	32
Smith	b Collar	35
Joel Whittaker	lbw Duggan	6
Layzell	b Chapman	23
Allchin	ct Richardson Bowled Fitzwater	48
Jalal Ahmed	ct Bloom Bowled Duggan	2
Robin Whittaker	ct Elgar Bowled Chapman	28
Dominic Whittaker	run out (Bloom)	33
Stephens	st Bloom Bowled Chapman	1
Fuad Ahmed	Not Out	2
K Barnes