Game of local rivals

The weather was looking good and even though this was ECC’s 3rd game of the season, it was some of the players 1st. By 9:45am, we had plenty of parents as well as more players than scheduled. Luckily both ECC and BCC had 11 players and we agreed it was played under the following rules:

11 players per side
Score starts at 200
Lose 4 runs for each wicket, 2 W, 2 NB
Each pair bats for 4 overs with the last pair playing a threesome over 6 overs
Captain: Aidan Malhotra
Wicket Keeper: Most of the boys took it in turns
Scorer: Sukh Sahota, Big Thank You!

ECC looked very professional from the start both in attitude and dress code and some of the parents even had matching deck chairs. Aidan was the captain and after a warm-up soon rallied the troops and was clear with his instructions, ‘work hard’, ‘do your best’ and most of all Have FUN!. BCC won the toss and decided to bat and even though we looked the part, the inexperience of BCC clearly showed. Tayyab and Jamie PT kicked-off the bowling and even though a little shaky, they both soon got into a rhythm with Tayyab getting a clean wicket.

The bowling flowed and the next four bowlers in Alex, Arun, Aman and Aidan all managed a wicket between them as well as keeping the BCC score to a minimum. There was some excellent fielding from the ECC boys, stopping the ball correctly, backing up both the wicket keeper and bowler between runs, and generally putting into practice things they had learnt on a Friday evening. By this time BCC had realised that a ‘hit and run’ strategy was needed and our next set of bowlers in Arran, Arvin, Lucas, Jamie W and Indie were very consistent and contained the BCC run rate. Arvin was noted for his venomous bowling and with continued patience will be excellent. Lucas started his over with 2 brilliant caught and bowls, he was very close to his hat trick, though did finally finish on a very impressive 3/2. Considering the inexperience, BCC finally finished on a respectable 258/8

ECC were feeling good after their bowling and the batting commenced at a good pace with Tayyab playing watchman and Jamie PT hitting ECC’s first boundary. By the time our next 4 batsmen entered the crease, we had already amassed an impressive total, even the parents were enjoying watching the quick runs between the wickets and the lovely 4’s from both Arun and Aidan. Our next set of batters in Arran, Arvin, Lucas, Jamie W and Indie batted very consistently with Jamie W and Indie hitting an impressive 7 and 8 runs respectively. Lucas joined in and thumped 14 including 3 glorious 4’s! ECC finally finished on 365/4 a winning margin of 107 runs, however BCC’s inexperience clearly showed.

At the end of the game ECC rallied and we shared a lessons learnt, well played boys thoroughly proud of you all!

Please vote for your own Man of the Match through Teamer however, Man of the Match for me was Lucas Smith, a fitting start for all on Father’s Day! J