Scorecard

Thatcham Town Cricket Club Thatcham 1XI- Saturday v Fleet on Sat 05 Sep 2009 at **12.30pm** Earlier start time
Thatcham Town Cricket Club Lost by 74 runs

Match report Thatcham crashed and burned against Fleet as they ended the season on a disappointing note with a 74 run defeat at Brownsfield on Saturday.

With a 13 point gap between leaders Harefield and the West Berkshire side, it was a vital toss for Duncan Johnson to win, but Fleet skipper Russell Black called correctly and decided to bat, immediately taking the chance of a 25 point victory away from Johnson’s side. News had filtered through from High Wycombe that Harefield were batting there against a woefully under strength High Wycombe 2nd XI, so even as the games began all Harefield had to do to win the title was get 200 batting first and claim the double batting points and anything else was irrelevant.

Fleet needed a win to give themselves a chance of TVL 1 survival and Black and Parker started against the Thatcham new ball attack of Andy Harland and Jack Andrews. With Parker content to play a supporting role, the onus was on Black to score and he did this at regular intervals reaching his 50 in the 15th over with the score on 63. Harland finally got his man, Parker constantly playing and missing, but eventually the edge came and Dan Stone did the rest. Nick Bishop was introduced and turned the screw for the home side, slowing the rate down and he claimed the wicket of Lee, caught by Stone for 12. Chris Bird was bowling in tandem with Bishop and the spin pair really made things difficult for the visitors and Bird had the next success when Thornton was well caught by Steve Wyatt for 12. Johnson then had the chance to deny his opposite number the chance of a century as Black offered a simple return chance to the Thatcham skipper on 99 which was inexplicably put down and Black went on to complete his 100 and then fell in the same over, Wyatt safely taking the catch to give Johnson his 30th league wicket of a good season. Talbot had batted well for his 36 before he fell to the Johnson/Wyatt combination and it was left to Lent and Bywaters to finish the innings off at 227-5 from the 52 overs. The wickets were shared around the Thatcham bowling, Johnson taking 2-52, Harland 1-34, Bird 1-24, and Bishop 1-26.

The news was through from Wycombe that Harefield had achieved their target, so it was a dejected Thatcham side that had to take up the chase and try and finish the season on a high. Openers James Ettridge and Duncan Johnson tried to start positively against the old ball, as Fleet opened with the spin of Singleton and the steady seam of Chalkley, but runs were hard to come by. Johnson went first, edging Singleton through to Talbot at 1st slip for 8 and it was a steady procession from them on as wickets fell regularly, only Ettridge really able to offer any resistance. Dan Stone played on to Newman for 3, Steve Wyatt fell to Singleton for 12, Danny Williams was lbw to Singleton for 13. Jamie Young joined Ettridge and played a lovely little cameo, showing what a good talent he is for the future, but he was very well stumped down the leg side by Parker off Chalkley for 22 and although Ettridge reached a fine 50, what followed was an embarrassing collapse as Thornton was gifted a hat-trick, Matt Denness bowled for 2, with Jack Andrews and Andy Harland then both following for golden ducks and Chris Bird fell in the same fashion, lbw to Chalkley and Thatcham had lost 4 wickets for 1 run to reduce them to 150-9 in the 38th over.
There were still 10 overs left to get the 77 runs required and there was hope as long as Ettridge was at the crease. He was joined ably by Nick Bishop and one wondered if the pair were going to pull off a great escape, but it wasn’t to be as Chalkley bowled Ettridge with a beauty to leave Thatcham 153 all out, Ettridge departing for a fine 74 with Bishop left not out on 2.

It was a disappointing end to a season that had a lot of promise and to still be in with a shout of the title on the last game was indeed something that the side can be proud of, but ultimately we ran out of steam in the last few weeks and allowed Harefield to nip in and deservedly take the title. They had an amazing end to the season, winning the last 4 games batting first and taking maximum points every time and all credit to them for finishing the season in that way. Mluleki Nkala, their former Zimbabwean test player had an amazing run of scores, with 154*, 60, 130* and 218 to rack up 562 runs in 4 innings at an average of 281, and if you add to that that he also took two 5-fors as well, then at the business end of the season he came to the party, whereas unfortunately Ali Naqvi had to return home due to a death in the family and who knows what might have been. But there are no excuses, we had a lead and we blew it at the end and overall the season has been a success. Some of the young lads have come into the side and proved they have what it takes to play at TVL 1 level, so in Jamie Young, Jack Andrews, Dan Stephenson and Nick Monger, we have lads for the future and there are more and more coming through, so we can build on what happened this season, take that experience and hopefully come back stronger in 2010.

Fleet Batting
Player name RunsMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 5 wickets
0
227 (0.0 overs)		     
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Thatcham Town Cricket Club Thatcham 1XI- Saturday Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Andy Harland12.0534134.002.83
Jack Andrews11.016500.005.91
Duncan Johnson12.0052226.004.33
Nick Bishop9.0026126.002.89
Chris Bird7.0024124.003.43
Matthew Denness1.00800.008.00

Thatcham Town Cricket Club Thatcham 1XI- Saturday Batting
Player Name RMB4s6sSRCatchesStumpingsRun outs
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 10 wickets
0
153		        
Duncan Johnson Caught  8
James Ettridge Bowled  74
Dan Stone Bowled  3 2
Steve Wyatt Caught  12 3
Danny Williams Lbw  13
Jamie Young Stumped  22
Matthew Denness Bowled  2
Jack Andrews Caught  0
Andy Harland Lbw  0
Chris Bird Lbw  0
Nick Bishop Not Out  2

Fleet Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
No records to display.

  • Umpire :
    Panel
  • Scorer :
    TBC