Theale & Tilehurst Friendly XI vs Reading University Staff 28th May 2006

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Report by Fingers

Following the heavy rain on Saturday and the wet nature of the pitch electing to bat first wasn’t the obvious decision for the skipper winning the toss. However, there often seems to be an air of disorganisation around the RUASCC team and their skipper was left with little choice but to bat considering half of his team hadn’t arrived at that stage.

I don’t know if Ferro and Ward were the intended openers but both batted well in a decent opening partnership. In this period the most amazing piece of cricket was a delivery from Bob which came straight in to my hands at first slip on the full without having been anywhere near the batsman.

Ferro and Ward saw off the opening burst from Lemmy and Bob and it was Osman that made the initial breakthrough when he had Ward caught at mid wicket, Ferro soon followed dragging one back in to his stumps.

Will was playing only his second game for the club and his first Sunday game so there was an opportunity to give him a good bowl. Having not played regular cricket recently his bowling was a little erratic as he mixed some very good deliveries with some not so good ones; inevitably it was the less good ones that ended up taking some of the wickets as the batsman seemed to forget the nature of a drying pitch and play over optimistic attacking strokes, Will demonstrating the virtues of bowling straight to pick up three clean bowleds.

After Fingers had mopped up an obliging tail T&T were left with 163 needed for victory which it was felt would be a stiff challenge on a demanding pitch. Raj played his usual innings (i.e. a couple of nice boundaries followed by hitting a full toss to mid on) before James and Khadim suggested that they would pick up from where they left off at Mortimer West End; the partnership ending when James was deemed to have edged on to the ‘keeper.

Spike and Khadim then got another partnership started before Khadim was run out going for an optimistic second run and then Spike and Stephen went in quick succession; 86-5 left a long way to go. However, in Meady and Osman we had a very useful lower middle order and they both played well as they put on a partnership of 57 for the sixth wicket. When Osman was bowled by the returning Ranjinair there was the possibility of a late wobble but Meady was able to take advantage of some loose leg side bowling from Zia to take us most of the way to the target. It was left to Lemmy to hit the final boundary to secure victory by four wickets with five overs to spare and inflict the first defeat of the season on the RUASCC team.