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Great Waltham Cricket Club

Scorecard

Little Waltham I v Great Waltham Cricket Club 1st XI on Sat 21 May 2011 at 1.30pm
Great Waltham Cricket Club Lost by 33 runs.

Match report Hmmm... It's Wednesday morning and only now can I bring myself to open the scorebook and write a report. Losing to Lt Waltham is always hard to stomach but to lose in this manner, it was far more bitter...

Put simply, a poor batting performance cost us dearly as we collapsed to 162 all out with over 7 overs remaining in pursuit of a very gettable 195.

Having lost the toss, we were asked to bowl first on a track that didn't look like the batting paradise you normally find at LWCC. DC opened up and removed 'Hudders' with the first delivery of the game. Hitting him on the full, smack bang infront of middle/off. There was a certain inevitability about it and although it caused a certain degree of amusement... sadly, he was to have the last laugh on the day. Faroog and Frank Thorogood then set about a partnership of 60 in double-quick time, punishing anything short and wide. The breakthrough was slightly fortuitous as Frank got a 'shooter' from J-Fitz that hit him bang in front. Farooq followed in the next over as Clouty 'did for him' with a wicked change of pace. Wickets then fell at regular intervals. Josh removing Howeson before debutant Ben Collar picked up the wickets of Harriram & Milburn in quick succession... one with a long-hop, the other a more classic off-cutter. Ollie Fitz then accounted for Gurney - Andy 'pouching' a catch at point - to leave Little Waltham struggling at 112-7.

Pat Clark then joined Phil Arnold and a costly dropped catch when down as another vital partnership of 60 materialised. Clark went for 29 with the score at 172-8. J-Fitz & Rob clearing up the tail as LWCC ended on 195-10 in the 39th over.

With 50 overs to get just under 200 runs, the equation was more simple than ever. The least said about the reply the better.

Once again, two early wickets left us rocking at 19-2 then regular wickets fell leaving us 34-3, 50-4 and 73-5. All we needed was one partnership to get us to within touching distance of our target but it simply didn't happen. When DC departed for 44 we were 94-6 in the 25th over... the run-rate equation was still the same but a slightly longer tail meant the job was going to be very difficult. A cameo from J-Fitz - including the shot of the day, a straight six back over the bowlers head, thanks in no small part to some woeful sledging from behind the stumps - was the only bright spot as I did my best to marshall No. 9, 10 & 11. The Little Waltham bowlers all did their bit but we had well and truly shot ourselves in the foot.

When I was last out we still needed 33 but with 7+ overs still to be bowled.

Ollie (Hopkins) made a point to me after the game that has stuck with me ever since: Out of the 20 wickets that fell in the match, how many were the result of 'a good ball' and how many were the result of a poor shot or poor technique? He ended by reminding me that "As a batsman, you might play a few good shots and hit a few boundaries but you can't get any runs when you're sat on a bench because you've got yourself out... ".

If we'd had an Ollie Hopkins in our batting order on Saturday... we'd have won that game. I'm sure he'd still argue that he could do a job...

Right... let's put it behind us and focus on Burnham. There were still a lot of positives to take from the game on Saturday.

Also, a big thank you to Nick Horne for stepping in at the last minute...

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Little Waltham I Batting

Player name		Runs
extras TOTAL :	for 10 wickets	0 195 (0.0 overs)
M Hudson	lbw Clout	0
S Farooq	ct Harris Bwld Clout	39
F Thorogood	lbw J Fitzwater	24
P Howeson	ct Bloom Bwld J Fitzwater	6
L Harriram	b Collar	14
B Milburn	b Collar	16
M Gurney	ct Elgar Bwld O Fitzwater	8
P Arnold	ct J Fitzwater Bwld Kearney	41
P Clark	ct Richardson Bwld J Fitzwater	29
M Williams	ct Bloom Bwld J Fitzwater	4
D Fell	Not Out	2