EMWCC 2's v AWE Tadley 2's

EMWCC 2's arrived at the AWE ground to be confronted with a very green and grassy wicket that had been rolled but not cut. So winning the toss was important and skip Trev Foreman duly called it wrong with EMW being asked to bat by the AWE skip.

Not surprisingly the ball not only swung but leaped from a length as openers Ben Stanbrough and Trev Foreman were put under considerable pressure. Ben took the attack to the bowlers but received the ball of the match which pitched well outside off stump and went on the hit middle stump! Trev was joined by Gareth Goodall and a very gritty and important partnership saw EMW to 51 off 16 overs. Gareth made a very valuable 14 and Trev 22.

'Younger than an evergreen' Dave Ling arrived at the wicket and carried on where he left off from last week.Together with a very elegant looking Rupert Brow, they made the wicket look easy by putting together a fantastic partnership of 146 runs with Dave making a hard hit 73 ( 7 fours and 1 six ) and Rupert 54 not out ( his highest score for the club). Extras contributed 39 runs ( 25 wides) to a very competitive total of 213 for 5.

A fantastic tea was enjoyed by all and AWE commenced their innings at some pace moving to 68 off 16 overs. They were 100 for 4 off 21 overs so, at the half way stage, were on track to get to a 200 run plus score with their skip Maton putting bat to ball and our bowlers under pressure.

Enter young Ollie Freemantle to the attack and with his fourth ball he yorked Maton and then did the same in his third over to remove a free scoring Mistry. Ollie then took a great catch to remove Monger swinging the match dramatically in favour of EMW. AWE Tadley were quickly bowled out for 133 giving EMW a win by 80 runs and a maximum haul of 24 points. All the bowlers stuck to their task with evergreens Trev Yeates taking 3 for 42 & Trev Foreman 3 for 13, Ollie Freemantle 2 for 21, Peter Duff 1 for 51 and Ben Stanbrough 1 for 0!