Theale & Tilehurst Friendly 1st XI vs Falkland 3rd XI

20th June 2009

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A couple of quiet pints after the game reminded me of how unlikely this game would have been when I first started playing senior cricket; the idea of scoring 254 let alone chasing it successfully would have been unimaginable.

But all this is getting ahead of ourselves as we need to start before the game did.  Pete Moore was very kindly umpiring for us but initially turned up at the main Falkland ground.  On getting out of the car he was greeted by the opposition umpire who opened with “Where’s Reg?”  Pete explained that he’d come in at short notice and the other guy went on to explain that he was fine with that as he didn’t particularly like or rate Reg.  The unfortunate thing was that Reg was just behind Pete as this was being explained and Pete was thinking that as he didn’t recognise many players he was probably at the wrong ground.

Once the umpiring situations had been sorted the game started and Chris soon had the opposition skipper lbw to one that kept low.  When Crofty took a good catch to dismiss Cullen and made the score 12-2 a low scoring afternoon seemed in the offing.

However, a partnership of 182 for the 2^nd wicket (and back to this later) between Rasman and Thomas changed proceedings.  Two or three catches went down in the partnership but once Cat took a catch to get rid of Rasman wickets started falling regularly.

So regularly in fact that by the time I’d picked up my sixth wicket the young Akram was still watching his cousin playing on the main ground.  The Falkland skipper was therefore obliged to declare with the score on 254-9 off 47.5 overs.

On a decent pitch with a fast outfield and short boundaries this was seen to be well within reach.  However, with two maiden overs first up and Cat going in the third things didn’t start too well.

Crofty and Wiggy steadied the ship without looking particularly fluent and took the score through to 63 before Wiggy went caught at mid off.

There then followed the second partnership of 182 for the 3^rd wicket of the match; this one being a 3^rd wicket record for Theale and Tilehurst. During the partnership Crofty played as well as he has for T&T and he reached his 100 off 100 balls.  Jamil wasn’t quite as convincing but reached his fifty from 32 balls as the partnership lifted the scoring rate.

On a ground that was always going to be difficult to defend T&T accelerated towards victory and a win by 8 wickets seemed likely.  However, it seems that Crofty wanted the glory of leaving the field alone so he chipped up a catch to long off and allowed James the chance to come on for a 0no.

As mentioned at the start this was in many ways an amazing chase.  To chase 254 with 12 overs to spare was a phenomenal effort and full credit goes to Crofty for playing one of the finest innings I have seen by a T&T player.