Winchmore Hill CC v Ealing CC

The game was played under the now so familiar rules:

20 over game
10 players a side
Each team starts on 200
Lose 5 runs for each wicket
'No-balls' and 'Wides' give away 2 runs and are not re-bowled

The Ealing boys turned up at Winchmore Hill ready to take on a side that was playing their first game of the season. The setting was lovely and the warm weather added to the great atmosphere. Ealing won the toss and elected to bat first. Silas and Indie opened the innings and manoeuvred the ball well to score 10 runs of the bat between them in the opening 4 overs. This also without the loss of any wickets. This set the tone nicely for the next pair of Zuhayr and Tanush to capitalise on. Zuhayr played aggressively and top scored with 19, which included four powerfully struck boundaries. We lost our first wicket in the 7th over, which could have easily been called a ‘no ball’ for height. However, I let this slide as I could see the jubilation on the bowler’s face which I did not want to retract. Also, even at this early stage of the game, I was confident that it would not make too much of a difference to the outcome of the game. Aidan and Jamie W were the next pair to come in and they batted sensibly. They added to the total, but unfortunately we did lose a second wicket at this point. Jamie W being undone by a good straight delivery. The next pair of Arun G (16) and Paul (14) provided a masterclass on running between the wickets. The communication between them was outstanding and of the 30 runs they scored off the bat, only 8 runs came from boundaries. That means 22 runs came from running 1’s and 2’s. When the final pair of Arvin and Tayyab entered the middle, Ealing were already in a strong position. This passage of play saw Arvin score his first four of the season, which gave him great delight. It was a powerfully struck pull to the boundary that Ricky Ponting would have been proud of. However, we lost 2 more wickets at this point, which included a suicidal run out. We have had one of these in every game so far, but this time it was outshone by many great batting moments. At the end of the innings we scored a commanding total of 314 for the loss of 4 wickets

So at the half way stage, Winchmore Hill were up against it and we knew they would have to bat well to win this. Ealing turned the screws even more by taking wickets at regular intervals. Fielders were close in to create extra pressure and by doing this the bowlers reaped the benefits. Ealing took 11 wickets in total with 8 of the 10 bowlers obtaining at least one wicket. Paul and Aidan produced the best bowling figures of 2/7 and 2/3 respectively. We kept things relatively tight all innings and only gave away 8 wides and 2 no balls. This is a massive improvement on previous games and just shows how far we have come along in a short space of time. A moment to savour in the field was when Zuhayr, who has proved difficult to score off all season and for most parts of this game, had a moment where he was pulled to the boundary for four. Following this, Zuhayr stood in the middle of the wicket with both hands on his hips, looking directly at the batsman. His eyes telling the whole story of 'How dare you hit me to the boundary for four'. He has probably seen too many videos of Pakistani bowling greats that he has tried to mimic their style.

Overall, a fantastic team performance from the Ealing boys. I am so proud of them all who continue to fight well in every game