BCCC v The Stage CC
The Stage CC 193
BCCC 196-2 (27 overs) Won by 8 wickets.
The last match report of the season so will try do it some justice. Finally back to winning ways with a convincing 8 wicket victory over Stage CC in 27 overs !!
BCCC lost the toss again and were put in to field on a semi damp pitch and lush outfield. Stage's captain Owen opened the innings with Huntley and took off like a freight train scoring 44 in 4 overs after taking a particular liking to Suraj who went for 28 runs in his 3 overs . Huntley departed lbw to Graeme who bowled with good line and length and ended up with great bowling figures of 7-1-26-2. Owen carried on on his merry ways to score a well earned 66 before Nikhil bowled him with one of his specials. Our overseas player Mo, also a Surrey over 50's 1st team off spinner, finally came on to bowl to show us how it's done. Bowled 5 overs and gave away 31 runs as the Stage bats took a liking to him too. Word has it this is the first match out of the 50 odd Mo has played this year where he has not got a single wicket .. I guess there is a first time for everything. Must be the higher standard of cricket at Barnes .. Our other resident off spinner Wal graced us with his presence in between the numerous holidays and weekends away to bowl and show us how it's done and very quickly got 3 wickets in quick succession to remove 3 main bats to end up with figures of 5-124-3. Other wickets were shared between Suraj, Vish and Nikhil. After a bit of aiji bhaji with a couple of Stage's umpires who thought they were part of the ECB elite group of umpires, Stage finally ended up with 193 off 35 overs. A good score on any wicket.
Tea was not to be as we knew it. Our lovely tea ladies decided it was too nice a day to bother turning up so we ended up with having not one but two sets of sandwiches on a sunny Barnes Common outfield . A welcome relief might I add . Thank you to both Suraj and Johnny for organising this. Might I add it was much better than the normal teas we end up having . Time for a change I guess !!
After tea, Barnes' opening bats Graeme and Nik started well and put on 75 runs in 12 overs before Graeme was put for 29 runs. Nik at this stage was going hammer and tongs and was on 39 runs. In walks Vish who also went after the bowlers to score a quick fire 22 with five 4's. Nik reached his 2nd 50 of the season with a six over midwicket after which Barnes lost their 2nd wicket and the score was 135 when Vish got out . In walked the Captain who promised not to hit a single ball in the air. It was not to be as instincts took off and a flurry of shots followed . It finally dawned that Nik was on 91, so quite close to scoring his century so the flurry stopped and Nik was given the strike to get on with it. Get on he did and in two shots reached his 2nd century of the season. A great 100 which consisted of seventeen 4's and three 6's. Barnes came away as winners in the 27th over scoring 196 runs to win by 8 wickets.
Man of the match - Nik for his 2nd century of the season. A great flawless knock (picture below).
Catch/s of the match - Suraj for a caught and bowled as well as a great running catch at point
Shot/s of the match - there were quite a few from Nik . Especially a few 6's over midwicket.
Captain's log on the 2016 season - a learning curve for yours truly. Tried to learn and do what I thought was in the best interest of the team and tried to involve as many players as possible in every game. I hope I succeeded in keeping most happy as it is nearly impossible to keep everybody happy and involved. I am sure I made some mistakes during my first year as Captain and hopefully I can learn from these and become a better Captain given time. Happy to carry on as Captain so will leave it to the AGM to know otherwise. A big thank you to all the players for putting up with me and for their support over the season. Much appreciated. Quite a few of the end results did not
go our way for one reason or the other. Mainly it was due to our batting which was not as strong as last year. We lost quite a few games with some very sloppy and ordinary fielding and thus made life difficult for ourselves by chasing a few too many runs than we had to. Overall 10 wins and 7 losses I guess was a fair representation of how we played this season. Hopefully with an influx of new and younger players our fortunes will change. So I urge current players to try to recruit at least one additional player each so that we have a bigger pool of players to choose from and thus improve our overall standard in the process.
