Theale & Tilehurst Friendly XI vs Stratfield Turgis 28th April 2001

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Report by Mr Ed

Have you noticed the changes to the website? Our previous backers, British Petroleum, ended their sponsorship of the website last week and with it their rather wearisome insistence on using yellow type on a green background. The Webmaster you will note has gone for a rather ingenious literary take on Brechtian theatre lighting i.e. stark white lighting onto black sets, so there you have it black type on a white background. Its brave, its radical but I think it might just catch on. One’s things for sure its easier to read.

The game against Stratfield Turgis was the second of our preseason friendlies and the last before the league programme starts next week. Unfortunately due to rain, it was not possible to finish the game that appeared to be swinging in our favour but their was still a number of points to get out of this match.

There was just one change from the team who played Marlow Park the previous week, with Mo Iqbal making his comeback replacing Brian Cooper who rested himself. After only two weeks in the role of First XI captain, Brian is already showing that he is a shrewd judge of a situation. Firstly, he drops himself after one week, so he’s a good judge of a player; secondly he’s sitting in the pavilion whilst his players are getting a soaking on the field.

Stratfield batted first, on a predictably slow and low wicket. Bob Williams and Chris Lemm opening the attack bowled economically helped by a sharper if still not flawless fielding performance. I’d just like to make a quick reminder to everyone in the club that the laws of the game do allow for some sort of effort to be made in trying to catch people out, this sort of practice tends to help the bowlers out and should be encouraged. We have joint winners, for the Philip Tufnell fielding award this week, Roger Puri who was unfortunate in that the ball did seem to follow him all day (or did the batsmen deliberately keep hitting it in his direction?) and Mo Iqbal who soon reminded everyone what we hadn’t missed last season.

Mo’s return to the club however is excellent news for T&T, and he soon demonstrated his ability with the ball by taking three wickets, all bowled, in his spell of six overs. The most satisfying of these was possibly his final wicket where after being dispatched for a violent flat six, he replied immediately uprooting the batsman stumps next ball.

Tim Sant also got in on the action with two cheap wickets, and it’s a relief to see that opposition batsman are just as clueless as his own team mates when it comes to dealing with his particular brand of bowling. [Opponents please note – This site does not divulge player’s action]. Bowling Warnee!

After some initial hard graft, Stratfield subsided from 61-2 to 73-6 before the rain become too heavy to continue playing. Further play initially looked possible, but a further heavy shower on a pitch unable to take too much more rain, ended hopes of any further play and the match was abandoned. Although this is obviously unfortunate we were probably lucky to play any cricket at all and we benefited from both Mo and Tim getting a bowl and wickets. Well you’ve got over a page out of me from a game that lasted only 27 overs which works out at about four words per ball, so I think you’ve got value for money. If you’re at a loose end I suggest that you visit the David Cumming website. Bye.