Scorecard

Olney Town Cricket Club Olney Town CC 2nd XI v New City 2nd XI on Sat 01 May 2010 at 1:30pm
Olney Town Cricket Club Won by 39 runs

Match report After last weekends cancellation (and a free 30 points), the Saturday 2nd XI got their season off to the best of starts with an excellent win over New City.

Guts' first game as skipper started well by forgetting his socks (prompting an urgent phone call home) and then losing the toss... We were inserted by New City on what was a greenish pitch and slow outfield following some heavy overnight rain.

Things were going well as we reached 80 for 1 with good contributions from Hurley J (36), Hurley D and Hallam (34) (fresh from a good night's sleep in Emberton Park). Quite how we ended up on 131 all out I am totally sure of - it was a dramatic middle order collapse due to some excellent swing bowling by New City (Raj Jhala 6-18), some dodgy shots and some dodgy umpiring - according to Golden (Gary) Brown, who 'textured like sun' was apparently triggered by the Emmerdale loving, Corrie loving, 'Buster' Smith (you heard it here first - the gentle giant is a soap fan).

An excellent tea followed (I sampled everything - it gets three James stars - the cricketing equivalent of the Michelin star). It was a great combination of pasta, salad, meats, sandwichesm, fruit and cake - thank goodness I wasn't opening the bowling.

Olney took to the field with New City requiring 132 from 60 overs but with a new found positivity (Guts and Hallam supressing the Eeyore like tendencies of Fillip and Dave Hurley). With an excellent start Oleny built the pressure with great opening spells from Drop of Golden Sun Filip (10-3-14-4: jug avoidance if every I've seen it) and Smith (10-2-30-0: bowling too well for the batsmen to hit it, and dropping a catch off his own bowling and having one just fall beyond my finger tips - in my defence if I can't reach it no-one can - if you're thinking 'anything that James can reach, Griffin can reach', look up 'inertia' on Wikipedia). First change and wickets continued to fall, with Guts (figures to follow) encouraging New City into the game with some leg side long hops just to keep it interesting and James (7-3-11-2) enjoying a pitch with a bit of lift. A well timed second change saw Jon Hurley convince the umpire that he was the Angel of the North for an over and then chip in with 1 and Ben Brown knock the middle stump out of the ground to wrap it up - with New City all out for 91. 30 pts for the second week in a row.

It was a great display in the field - holding all our decent chances (Jewson 2, James 2 and D Hurley with a fine diving catch, belying his age), some very quick tight fielding from John Cadigan in particular and two great run outs from Golden Brown and 'Legs move faster than his body' Filip. But fielding moment of the day came from Golden Brown who chased the ball to the boundary, and as it came to rest in the long grass, promptly dived on it and threw it over the boundary, demonstrating such incompetence that perhaps he should be re-dubbed Gordon Brown.

All in all a really enjoyable game with a friendly spirited opposition. Bring on Eggington Forresters.

Olney Town Cricket Club Olney Town CC 2nd XI Batting
131 for 10
Player Name RunsCatchesStumpingsRun outs
Dave Hurley Bowled  15 1
Jon Hurley Bowled  36
Mark Hallam Caught  34
Gary Brown Lbw  0 1
Jack Jewson Caught  4 2
Stuart Griffin Bowled  1
Ben Brown Caught  2
John Cadigan Lbw  4
Ray Filip Caught  9
Paul Smith Not Out  11
Iain James Lbw  0 2

New City 2nd XI Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Burjor7.5029129.003.70
Waghul2.001100.005.50
Sree5.0129129.005.80
Dhaval7.0040220.005.71
Raj7.011863.002.57

New City 2nd XI Batting
92 for 10
Player name Runs
S. Dave Caught  Jewson bowled Filip 7
Deeps Caught  James bowled Filip 8
Sree Caught  James bowled Filip 9
J. Dave Caught  D. Hurley bowled Filip 17
V. Sahane Run out  (G Brown) 1
Burjor Bowled  James 9
Raj Tailor Caught  Jewson bowled James 5
Vijay Run out  (Filip) 10
Dhaval Bowled  B. Brown 8
Waghul Lbw  J. Hurley 2
Eldon Not Out  0

Olney Town Cricket Club Olney Town CC 2nd XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Paul Smith10.023000.003.00
Ray Filip10.031443.501.40
Iain James7.031125.501.57
Stuart Griffin5.002500.005.00
Jon Hurley3.00717.002.33
Ben Brown1.20212.001.50