Seekers make it two out of two at Etwall
Posted Thursday, July 19, 2007
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Sunseekers 144 (Williamson 25 retired, Harry 25 retired, Ashton 25 retired, Bennett 200, will never retire)
Etwall Veterans 121 (Ashford 0-17 off 4, Thornton 2-14 off 4)
His first 2 balls were totally unplayable ...
Teamwork, that's what Sunseekers are all about, so here is a report written in the first half by Colston with Kevin taking over after the secretary departed close to the end of our innings on a surprisingly glorious evening at Etwall.
It might just have been the most powerful Sunseekers batting line-up of recent years not to feature Carpo and Mick that lined-up against Etwall, with Matthew fresh from his career-best 72 in the league on the Saturday.
But there was early hilarity when Captain Fred, his eyes now about as good as his ears, mistook Kevin "Bivouac" Woodward's huge kit bag for the club bag and was ranting about all the bats having been nicked. What he wasn't to know is that the ever-practical Bivouac's bag has a dual purpose. It is big enough for Bivouac to sleep inside under the stars on his many trips to the far-flung corners of the earth, like France, the north of Scotland and Wirksworth. Indeed, without Woodward's stinking kit, it has three rooms and also sleeps Mrs Woodward. Mick Wenn is understood to have inquired about the deluxe version with integrated bog.
Do I digress? I surely do. Matty took all of 2.3 overs to reach the retirement score of 25 in an awesome display and Gareth, slightly more cultured, was not much slower. Howard arrived late, missing only the first ball Matty had unceremoniously clunked for four, and was able to take his place for another nicely-stroked 25. With decent efforts from Paul Downs, Gibbo, Stuart "I've been dropped before I've even played this year" Greasley and camoes from Ross and Karl, the innings progressed positively and we were on about 135 off 14 overs when I had to leave. And so, over to Kevin...
... cheers Col, it could be worse, I could be a dead ringer for Howard of the Halifax (definitely worse than resembling a mass murderer) - can you sing and dance as well?
Now to the end of the innings. Stuart's departure on the first ball of the last over brought Fred to the crease. He was in a belligerent mood and scored 7 sixes of the last 7 balls (how does that sound Fred - better than "Ye Olde Golde"?). Back to reality, when Fred went first ball for 0, BB headed out to the middle and played a courageous and magnificent innings, spearheading the final 6 ball and 5 run frenzy and ending with 2no. Super Brian.
Fred, inspired by his success with the bat, opened the bowling from the Church End. His first 2 balls were totally unplayable and the batsman could not lay a bat on them. Unfortunately, since 'Keeper Gareth Harry took the ball at third slip, the umpire harshly signalled a wide for each one. Fred stomped back muttering that it was "only 6 feet from the batsman" and "he could have got there if he had stretched a bit". The two "looseners" seemed to do the trick and the rest of his spell was genuinely very good. Meanwhile at the other end, Brian did his best to make sure that Etwall kept up with the asking rate, allowing them to take 11 off each of his overs. "Takes me a bit of time to get my rythym these days" he said later - a fact verified after the match by Mrs Bennett. Karl took over from Fred at the Church End and, like Fred, bowled extremely well, cramping the batsmen and keeping the score down. It was inevitable that he would get wickets and he did - 2 of them. The first was an absolute purler, an inswinging yorker. Ross bowled well but struggled at times with his line, straying down leg side so the batsmen kept Fred, Paul and Karl busy covering the short boundary.
The fielding was good, but being on a decent ground always helps, I think Matty was the only one who had a bad bounce. In the first few overs, Howard, fielding about 2 miles away in the covers, was frequently called into action, the ball also seemed to follow Karl "I'm still young enough to bend down to pick up the ball" Thornton had a fair bit to do, as did Fred, Paul and myself (I was quite relieved when the one chance that came my way stuck, given my dire performance at Muggington!).
Although Etwall were always a little behind the rate, the game was by no means settled until the last couple of overs, I reckon the margin belies how close the game was - a couple of bad overs from Fred or Karl and the result could have gone the other way. Gareth was as sharp as ever behind the stumps and whipped off the bales a good few times, eventually claiming one victim late in the innings. The 2 byes that went down against his name could easily have been called as leg side wides.
There was one contender for fielding champagne moment. The ball whistled past Paul for 4 so off he trotted to retrieve it. As he approached the resting point of the aformentioned object he started pussyfooting around and appeared to be searching for the ball even though it was pretty obvious where it was. It turned out that it had ended up at the back of a huge swamp of rotten semi-liquid grass cuttings and he was looking for the least messy way through. Nice!
Back in the pavillion, the after match banter turned into a DBE/BB bowling technique clinic - becoming very animated as DBE gave some very good windmill impressions to Ross, with his right hand man BB chipping in with other helpful comments like "super" and "you were magnificent Dave, magnificent".
To sum up, a beautiful evening and a great game played in the usual sociable vein. Many thanks to Etwall for their customary hospitality and the excellent spread afterwards.
