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The 2nd team found themselves up against a Kesgrave team strengthened by a number of first team players and desperate for promotion. On being put into bat the Brockley openers found the opening overs challenging in the extreme; on a green drying wicket and against a swinging ball runs were at a premium; in fact Blackledge,after 10 overs had only scored a single, and that as a result of umpire Fisher failing to signal a bye! Once again Blackledge’s running was somewhat kamikaze but his winter fitness programme has paid rich dividends as surprisingly he was less knackered than his opening partner. Once the long and tedious opening partnership was broken the remainder of the team’s batting crumbled; of the middle order only Fisher and Brame looked in any sort of form and it was disappointing that the experienced Fisher after getting set failed to go on to marshal the rest of Brockley’s’ inexperienced batting line up.
Although an improvement on previous weeks abject batting on an improving wicket and against a strong batting side the Brockley score of 157 was going to be difficult to defend and so it proved.
Kesgrave only lost three wickets in chasing down the Brockley score and dropping the top scorer three times didn’t help the teams cause. The captain during the first match set the trend of the season so far by dropping a dominant opposition batsman and the theme continued as Kesgrave’s best batsman was the fortunate recipient of Brockley’s generosity. If we are to win a game or two our catching and batting are the two crucial disciplines in need of dramatic improvement. Grimwood seemed to have caught Blackledge’s biliousness of the previous week and as a result his previously excellent bowling was out of sorts. After last weeks strangely erratic spell young Brame was back to his best and Kimber bowled aggressively however with his considerable talent he is capable of more. Whilst Fisher, although slow to get into his rhythm was his usual accurate self the best Brockley bowling was from the mercurial Mingay who proved that he is capable of bowling long accurate and hostile spells.
Despite the dropped catches the team tried hard, the boys are good strong characters and always give of their best. The ground fielding, lead by the excellent Nice and Brame senior was again keen. The captain’s only complaint is that he would appreciate more vocal support from the fielders of his team’s young bowlers?
The Captain found his man of the match award this week difficult; there were three contenders; Nice for his enthusiastic ground fielding; Blackledge for his dour but important innings and Mingay for an encouraging spell of bowling. With some reluctance I have plumped for Blackledge as his innings illustrated a consistent improvement from last year abysmal efforts.
Phil Reed |
