Scorecard

Thatcham Town Cricket Club Thatcham 1XI- Saturday v Reading on Sat 18 Jul 2020 at 1:00pm
Thatcham Town Cricket Club Lost

Match report Thames Valley League Cricket returned to Brownsfield as Thatcham Town CC hosted Reading CC in a fixture that seemed somewhat unlikely through the spring and the early parts of the summer. Nevertheless, with the sun shining and the ground in an immaculate condition, we could finally rejoice that league cricket was back.

A long awaited first coin toss for the not so newly appointed 1st XI captain, Jack Young, saw Thatcham put the visitors into bat. Michael Green probed away with the new ball settling into a tight opening spell in which the watchful Jheeta and Chima found it difficult to score freely. 1st team debutant Harvey McKay found his feet with an opening spell of pace and movement that saw him return figures of 0-13 off his first 4 overs. Eventually Green (1-42) found a well-deserved breakthrough when he bowled Chima with a full, swinging delivery and Thatcham were seemingly underway for the campaign. However, Donsangh (33) joined Jheeta at the crease and proceeded to try and accelerate the run rate whilst Usman Ijaz and Rhys Lewis toiled away without any further wickets heading into the middle overs.

The evergreen spin pairing of Nick Bishop (1-24) and Chris Bird (0-45) maintained control through to the 30th over, with Bishop removing the explosive Donsangh courtesy of a sharp diving catch by Jack Young in the covers. Ominously, Jheeta was still at the crease and was joined by the dangerous Bevan, and the pair increased the run rate steadily in the last 10 overs before Jheeta fell for an exceptional innings of 90, to Rhys Lewis, with the last ball of the 34th over. The young off-spinner then proceeded to take the wickets of Akram and Davis with the first 2 balls of the 36th over to complete an outstanding hat-trick, much to the delight of the many spectators that had gathered on this hot July afternoon. This unfortunately didn’t entirely stem the flow of runs as Reading made 213-5 off their 40 overs, a few more than looked likely at the 30 over mark.

Following a tea interval not quite like that of any other we’d seen before, Thatcham were quietly optimistic that the target was one that was within reach. Opening pair Rhys Lewis and Peter Spriggs got the innings underway and 3 early boundaries looked to settle any nerves for the home side. Almost in the blink of an eye, 2 quick wickets from Akram saw Thatcham slip to 32-2 as both openers were dismissed. The rebuilding process looked solid with Jack Young (52) and debutant Usman Ijaz (30) seeing the hosts through to drinks further unscathed at 65-2. Scoreboard pressure was beginning to tell with tight bowling from spinners Malik (1-16), Nasim (1-37) and Saranavan (2-31) seeing the run rate up to 8 runs per over, leaving Thatcham needing to find some runs and quickly. Jack Young made a determined 52 before finding Deep Square Leg sweepin Reading captain Atif Nasim which sparked a dramatic collapse that saw Thatcham losing 6 wickets for 16 runs as the ever increasing run-rate saw the game ebbing away from the home side. Some brave lower order hitting from Chris Bird (25) saw a late flurry of boundaries but when he fell to Chima Thatcham were finally bowled out for 170, Reading winning the match by 43 runs with 2 balls to spare.

Albeit a disappointing result, Thatcham can take heart from some encouraging individual performances and also some lessons learned heading into next week’s clash away at Eversley. The overriding thought of the day being we are all extremely grateful to see club cricket return.

Reading Batting
Player name RunsMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
11w 2lb 
for 5 wickets
13
213 (40.0 overs)		     
Sanjit Jheeta ct  Rhys Lewis 90
Pavendeep Chima b  Mike Green 11
Amardeep Dosanjh ct  Nick Bishop 33
Jack Beavan Not Out  35
Rehan Akram lbw  Rhys Lewis 13
Thomas Davis b  Rhys Lewis 0
Waqas Ahmed Not Out  18
Amandeep Singh  
Khalid Zafar Malik  
Atif Nasim  
Arjan Srinivasan  

Thatcham Town Cricket Club Thatcham 1XI- Saturday Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Mike Green8.0142142.005.25
Harvey Mackay5.013000.006.00
Usman Ijaz5.002300.004.60
Rhys Lewis8.0047315.675.88
Nick Bishop6.0124124.004.00
Chris Bird8.004500.005.63

Thatcham Town Cricket Club Thatcham 1XI- Saturday Batting
Player Name RMB4s6sSRCatchesStumpingsRun outs
extras
TOTAL :
9w 4b  
for 10 wickets
13
170		        
Peter Spriggs ct  Rehan Akram 8
Rhys Lewis ct  Rehan Akram 10
Jack Young ct  Atif Nasim 52
Usman Ijaz ct  Khalid Zafar Malik 30
Gregor Wells b  Arjan Srinivasan 1
Rhys Williams ct  Arjan Srinivasan 11
Jamie Young run out  Jack Beavan 9
Nick Bishop b  Amandeep Singh 4
Chris Bird ct  Pavendeep Chima 25
Mike Green run out  Jack Beavan 7
Harvey Mackay Not Out  0

Reading Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Amandeep Singh8.0033133.004.13
Rehan Akram5.0021210.504.20
Khalid Zafar Malik8.0216116.002.00
Atif Nasim8.0037137.004.62
Arjan Srinivasan8.0031215.503.87
Thomas Davis2.002000.0010.00
Pavendeep Chima0.40818.0012.00