A relatively youthful Sunday side took to the field on Sunday under the temporary leadership of Nick Walker which got off to a fantastic start as he won the toss only to get confused over what he wanted to do. So, after being mistakenly put into bat, Acme got off to a very good start with the opening ball of the innings being dispatched for a juicy 4 by Johnson (20) off an Ed Walker (9-3-27-2) loosener. The opening partnership of Johnson and Bonner (9) accumulated the runs quickly but were out equally as quickly, both being caught on the boundary off of the bowling of Ed Walker: one of which was taken very nicely by the debutant Alex Mazzon (that’s Mazzon Pat!) Alex (7-0-42-1) continued a lovely start to his debut by taking the wicket of Whining (9) after replaced Nigel (8-0-52-0) at the Pavilion End who had bowled well (although the figures might suggest otherwise!) Barrow (43) joined Bowden (88*) at the crease and they shared a partnership of 98 before Barrow fell to the expert bowling of Nick Walker (3-0-13-1) backed up by a tidy catch by Ray Trick at slip. Dan Setterfield’s devious spin (4-0-29-1) deceived Glitch who was caught in the covers by Mazzon. The innings ended on 227-5 and Shoreham went into a beautiful Rivett tea pondering their chances of success.

Shoreham’s innings got off to a slow but steady start with Alex Haysler (60*) and Ray scoring 42 off the first 18 overs. Ray fell to ‘the growler’ Prest for 26 which brought Nick Walker to the crease. He (13) and Nigel (0) were both bamboozled by the spin of Thompson and Nigel took the opportunity to join the much coveted Duck Cup which is already being fiercely contested. Martin (35) then joined Alex at the crease and the pair shared a partnership of over 70 with both parties playing some fantastic shots (Alex needs to chuck in a few more reverse sweeps though!!) After Martin had been stumped, Ed came to the middle and hit a lovely 6 before departing for 11. Kumar came in and steadied the ship with an expert boundary to end on 5 not out. Shoreham ended up with a losing draw but the bandwagon will continue over to next week when the Sunday team are met with the challenge of St Mary’s and the prospect of watching another Haysler reverse sweep!

- George

Posted on Sunday, 25th April, 2010 in Friendly Match Reports.