Scorecard

Cosby Cricket Club 2nd XI v Croft II on Sat 16 May 2009 at 2pm
Cosby Cricket Club Won by 10 wkts (24 pts)

Match report 19 May 2009 : Croft crushed as 2nd XI maintain 100% record

Cosby II vs Croft II, May 16th 2009

With Woody installed as captain for the remainder of the season the 2s hosted perennial strugglers Croft to Victory Park aka The Home of Cricket. The team was much changed again from last weeks trip to Rothley with Foxall and Adam Cooper coming in to the side for the first time this season. In a sign of his enthusiasm for his new role Woody wanted the lads down the park bright and early (well 12:30) to help with preparations. All this meant was extra time standing around as Veteran had done most of the work that morning. This meant the time was spent listening to Coop tell Tommy Torres how he used to keep himself amused when he were a lad with such wholesome pass times as cotton knocking and knock-a-door run.

With Coop getting misty eyed over his time as a character in the Beano Woody went out for the toss. On a day with plenty of rain about and an already damp wicket the plan was clear, win the toss and bowl first. Again the new skipper failed in his duty and lost the toss but remarkably on day wetter than Nigel’s handshake the Croft captain decided to have a bat. After getting over the shock of being asked to bowl and Coxy's Chariots of Fire style sweater, the 2s went out in the knowledge that if we could get rid of the Croft openers cheaply then that would be half the battle. The breakthrough should have arrived early on when the clean hitting Hurd pulled a delivery off Veteran Captain Paul Wood straight to Coxy only for him to spill the chance. After this Hurd took a bit of a liking to Woody hitting him for a few boundaries before being caught at cover by Adam Cooper off the bowling of Michael “Wincey Willis” Whitehead for 19.

With the dismissal of Hurd came a deteriation in the weather as the drizzle got more persistent and by the time Big was due to replace our rain guru, had turned into a downpour. Fortunately the covers were at hand and not too much rain got onto the wicket. This would not deter the Croft skipper Heald though who appeared determined to get the game called off as it was hard to stand up when he was batting. His argument may have carried a bit more weight had he been wearing studs in his boots. After an hour of putting covers on and taking it off again the game was able to resume as a 36 over contest and Croft were 30 for 1 off 10 overs. Realising that staying off as long as we did had been to our advantage the 2s re-took the field confident of dismissing the young looking Croft side cheaply.

Big was finally able to start his spell and although the rain remained persistent the 2s were determined not to let the elements beat them and braved the rain. During the next few overs there was a piece of fielding by a Cosby player that had to be seen to be believed. The Croft opener Criessen hit the ball straight to Usain Fairbrother and ran. Now Mr Criessen is of similar build to Usain and so an interesting contest should have been in the offing. Rich picked the ball up took a shy at the stumps and ball flew threw the air, unfortunately it went backwards and Rich nearly managed to throw the ball onto his own head and Criessen made it in comfortably. Big was able to remove Criessen a few overs later with another caught and bowled and the 2s appeared to have opened up an end as the remainder of the Croft side apart from one other senior appeared to be very young and in one case very female.

Woody decided he didn’t like bowling in the rain so gave the ball to last weeks 5-wicket hero Tom Measures. Big feet proceeded to bowl excellently again and had Crofts skipper and last real hope of any runs in all kinds of trouble. At the other end cow scarer in chief Billso was brought into the attack for the 1st time this season and it was with his slower ball that he lulled Heald into having a big swing only to send the ball straight down Veterans throat for an easy catch. After this there was a flurry of wickets with 3 for Measures who was at one stage on a hat trick and another for Billso and Croft were 7 down for 90.

In at number 9 came a youngster called Riviera who didn’t have any spikes and appeared to be playing in plimsolls on a very slippy surface. Watching the young lad run will remain one of the highlights of the year as he had to stop yards from the crease and just slide in. It was like something from Dancing on Ice. Unfortunately for him he was more Todd Carty than Ray Quinn and when he attempted a 2nd run at one stage his legs were moving but he just went nowhere due to his lack of grip and got run out by half the length of the pitch. With rain easing off Paul “I only bowl when the sun shines” Wood brought himself on to clear up the tail. To be fair to our veteran captain he did this to good effect removing the last 2 Croft batsmen with minimum fuss and we had managed to bowl Croft out for just 108 in 32 overs.

With rain still about we went off for a mercifully salad free tea (phew!!!) wondering if we would be able to get enough overs in for us to get the runs. This was despite the constant assurances from Wincey Whitehead that any rain would just be a passing shower and blow over very quickly.

This being our 4th game of the season naturally we had a 4th different opening pair. The lucky pair this week were Russ “VC” Sullivan and Nick “Barry from Eastenders” Baker. Despite a few brief showers the weather stayed reasonably dry for our innings and Barry and VC set about scoring the runs in pretty quick fashion. The bowling to be fair was not of the highest standard but Baker and Sullivan despatched it with minimum fuss. The 50 was up in the 8th over and for some reason half our team was padded up. Russ gave one half chance when he chipped the ball in between a group of 4 fielders, but his trick of going Oh No very loudly paid off again as they all left it to each other and Russ survived.

With little troubling the 2 batsmen it became apparent this was going to be a race to 50 and Barry obviously keen to get back to the car lot was soon up to 47. However Russ then got a fair bit of the strike and hit a few boundaries to get himself in contention for the first to 50 honour. However Baker got served up a nice half tracker and was able to hit for 4 to get his first half-century of the season. A few more boundaries followed and the score had moved on to 107 when Baker hit another 4 to take us to our victory target for a 10 wicket win with Baker 56 not out and Sullivan 43 not out.

Result: Cosby win by 10 wickets
Points: Cosby 24 points, Croft 2 points.

Quote of the day: During our innings Coxy is annoying everyone by sitting in the corridor of the dressing rooms and getting people to move so he could see.
Woody: Would you please get your arse out here and pack in moaning.
Coxy: Do you want me out there so I can go in and bash the winning runs?
Billso: You’ve never bashed anything in your life, other than your dick!

MOM: some fine performances from all the bowlers and in the field with everyone doing their bit at times. Man of the match though goes to Nick Baker for his 56 not out as well as his fine performance as wicket keeper.

Verdict: On a day where it would have been easier to give in to the weather the 2s were able to pick up a comprehensive win over a pretty poor Croft side who for most of the day were trying their best to get out of playing and take the 4 points. Or as Foxy put it “Today, cricket was the winner.”

Croft II Batting
Player name RunsMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 10 wickets
0
108 (0.0 overs)		     
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Cosby Cricket Club 2nd XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Paul Wood11.0130215.002.73
Michael Whitehead5.03616.001.20
Phil Needham6.0019119.003.17
Tom Measures6.022036.673.33
Matthew Bills3.001929.506.33
Adam Cooper1.00600.006.00

Cosby Cricket Club 2nd XI Batting
Player Name RMB4s6sSRCatchesStumpingsRun outs
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 0 wickets
0
111		        
Russell Sullivan Not Out  43
Nick Baker Not Out  56 2 1
Mark Foxall  
Matt Cox  
Richard Fairbrother  
Paul Wood   2
Phil Needham   1
Tom Measures  
Michael Whitehead  
Adam Cooper   2
Matthew Bills  

Croft II Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
No records to display.

  • Umpire :
    K. Needham
  • Scorer :
    T.Measures