Playing at Twyford – but not against Twyford – in fact against St Cross – whose home ground was full of other games.
Beautiful sunny day – emerald-green, manicured lawns.
G won the toss and invited St Cross to bowl.
A bright start against some wayward bowling was cut short when Leo was trapped on the crease and Alex, caught in two minds, chipped a low full toss back to the bowler.
Jon and Benno steadied the ship until ‘the publican’ (11) got himself in a tangle and was bowled off his pads.
Ed (15) showed gritty mid-innings resistance for 52 balls, until, looking to force the pace, was deceived by one of Rams’ trademark super-stratospheric loopers.
Rishi (13), entertaining as always, smashed a six, ran out the impressive Benno (57), and then topped a reverse sweep to the keeper.
OC kept things moving with a couple of lusty blows and Nine (Sepia; 10 no), Ten (G) and Jack (HoT) chipped in to take the total to 155 for 9 – 30 shy of par and 50 of what we hoped for.
After tea with Samosa-fuelled bellies we then took back to the field hunting for early wickets. Three came courtesy of fantastically accurate opening spells from Rishi (fast missiles; 2-27) and HoT (slow wobblers; 2-26).
Greedy for more wickets, G rang the changes, bringing on Leo (1-29), mixing left-arm in-dippers and orthodox leg breaks and OC (1-42), intense and focused as always.
Despite this the St Cross batsmen gradually established control. With about 20 overs gone they looked to be cruising to victory.
But the Racqueteers’ refused to lay down and took 5 wickets for 9 runs in as many overs, leaving our opponents on 133-9 with just a handful of overs left, Benno being instrumental (2-26).
At this point, however, St Cross’ impressive number 4returned to the crease, having earlier retired, and proceeded to knock off the outstanding runs leaving one over to spare.
This was a great game, a real thriller, between two well matched sides.
Benno, man-of-the-match, deserves a special mention – he not only scored a maiden half century for the Racqueteers, bowled a lovely tight eight over spell he also took a steepling catch and executed a smart run out – all while complaining about a bad back!
The Racqueteers Cricket Club 