New Ifield v 3rd XI

Top v Second was always going to be a hard fought game and it didn’t disappoint. Steve finally won an away toss and against his normal choice of bat first he wanted to see what this unbeaten New Ifield were all about, so he put them into bat on a wicket that makes BGS look like …well BGS. Jack Woods playing his first third eleven game opened the bowling and in truth was too good for even the accomplished Ifield upper order, his first spell, 5 overs, 1 run & plumbing the opener lbw early on. Shuk took over Woodsy and he also produced a high class spell, unlucky to only pick up the solitary wicket thanks to a catch at mid-off by Ravi. New Ifield plugged along at a fairly sluggish rate, only being helped by the rare occurrence of the ball ricocheting of Archie’s boot and pinging the unattended helmet for ‘Five’ penalty runs. First change Ryan from Nick’s wicket less end picked up a scalp late into his 7 over spell, again thanks to a mid-off catch by Ravi. Woodsy was brought back to dismiss the stubborn opener for 30 and Billy Hally was next change, but even before he had bowled a ball he bemoaned the short boundary and was proved right as 20 Pravan Bali runs came from a cut short 2 over spell. Steve asked Nick to take over from Billy and first ball had big hitting Pavan Bali caught by Neil. As the other 9 Heath players were celebrating with Nick, Steve was approached by their Umpire, who stated that as Nick had not informed him of the change of bowler from that end, so technically it was a dead-ball. Even if slightly pedantic the umpire was in his right to call the batsman back from his disrobing of his pads. The Heath’s disappointment didn’t have time to fester as 2 legitimate balls later he did the same, this time to Ryan on the boundary. Next over Nick picked up another wicket with another mid-off catch by Ravi. New Ifield were now at 119 for 6 with 8 overs to go and looking to post a hard to get target, but if the scoring had been well contained by the Heath’s five bowlers up to now, it virtually ceased to snail’s pace, only Archie’s helmet was scoring at a significant run rate as another glance off his boot made a bee-line for five more penalty runs. The reluctant Billy was brought back, but this time from the other end with a much more generously distant boundary rope. An a now smiling Billy picked up 3 for 1 in 8 balls, in between Nick picked up his third wicket courteous of another Ravi mid-off catch, you would have thought their batsman would have learnt by now not to take on Ravi, who finished with 4 catches and New Ifield all out for a judged just slightly below par score of 132 at tea. The New Ifield banqueting mob were very quiet at tea, almost consigning defeat not scoring enough runs. If the other way round, Steve would have been chirping encouragement at his troops that “That is a more than a winnable score on that wicket”. In reply The Heath’s openers found scoring difficult but not impossible. At the 20 over drinks break, three were back in the hutch for 50, Graham (6) miscuing a pull short, Ravi (14) haplessly chopping onto his stumps and the Skip (17) LBW, although not sure leg before what the umpire saw, maybe the slips legs. With both opening bowlers now bowled out the game was equally balanced, but swung heavily in favour of the hosts, as Archie (5) and Mitchell (duck) were bowled in quick succession. The skip was now in deep conversation with the overtly interested Jacqui Langley as to how many points we can get out of this losing match. 8 points, 9 points were chalked off, maybe we can get on the A2 back to London with 12 or even 13 points he and Jacqui optimistically thought. But Neil & Woodsy had other ideas, Neil pushed the ball around into gaps for 1s and 2s, and even punished the odd bad ball for a couple of 4s, Woodsy at the other end tried a completely different approach, if it’s there I’m smashing it, which he did, half a dozen 4s later and 38 not out from 35 balls had seen The Heath win this top of the table clash with 9 balls to spare. Not enough can be said of Neil’s intelligent 29 not out when the pressure was on and a perfect foil for Jack, their match winning 57 partnership was nigh chanceless and at nearly a run a ball. Man of the Match was easily Jack Woods who was up for this game from the start and stamped his class with both bat and ball.