Two in a row for the 1st XI as Tom Morton Breaks The League Record

Ealing v Teddington

Venue: Away Weather: Sunny but chilly
Pitch: Hard and flat Toss won by: Teddington

Result: Ealing win by 33 runs.

Ealing: 363-6 (50)
Tom Morton: 232
Robbie White: 58

Teddington: 330-9 (50)
Ahmed Elech: 4-75
Jayden Park: 3-47

Report:
Our first away match of the season was a trip to Bushy Park to play Teddington, a fixture that has always been a hard fought contest. The warm weather from the week had faded and an Arctic northerly wind blew in across the park as the warm up started. A newly relaid square caused some headaches for both captains as they weighed up their options, but on winning the toss the Teddington skipper chose to bowl first.

We got off to a flier, with Tom Morton launching his first six in the second over; but there was some early movement in the air and off the pitch which saw Stoughton then Wilkin removed to leave us 42-2.

Robbie White came in and batted fluently again with Morton, who brought up his 50 in the 12th over. The pair added 155 in the next 20 overs, with Robbie passing his second half-century in as many games, and then Tom going to his maiden ECC century.

We were now well on top at 200-2 off 30 overs, and even when Robbie was caught behind for 58, Tom kept going, passing 150 with his third six. Ahmed (17) and he added another 48, then a further 56 with Jonsey (10) as we passed 300 for the first time in three innings.

Then, suddenly, Tom was on 199, and with a pull to the deep-square leg boundary we had our second double-centurion in two weeks. Now the only question was: Could he break Oli’s record? The League record stood at 215 for 20 years, then Oli smashed 227 last week. Now, seven days later, Tom went past that, to the huge cheers of the Ealing players. He was finally caught off the last ball of the innings for 232 off 158, including 26 fours and 7 sixes, and had taken the total to a mammoth 363-6.

After the break we took to the field, Teddington needing 7.3 runs an over from the off. However our seamers struggled to find the life that the home bowlers enjoyed early on, the scoreboard racing to 50 off five overs. The wicket was playing very well and the ball was flying to the boundary, and although Ahmed got the breakthrough in the ninth over, the runs kept on coming.

That was until the spinners came on, immediately pushing the run rate down and the required rate back up towards seven runs per over. Laney removed the other opener for 72 with a simple caught and bowled, but this brought in the home side’s danger man, their overseas player who smashed a 50-ball century last week against Twickenham

He didn’t take long to get into his stride, launching two huge sixes and causing the fielders to spread. But the key wicket came when Jayden beat the advancing batsman in the flight, resulting in an easy stumping for Robbie and swinging the game dramatically in our favour.

Teddington however weren’t going down without a fight. The next pair added 85 in the next nine overs, but wickets kept falling, with Ahmed, Kristian and Jayden all chipping in. The home side’s number three brought up his century in the 45th over, but it was too little too late and we ended up winning by 33 runs.

For the full scorecard:
http://ealing.play-cricket.com/website/results/2806648

And the league results and standings:
http://www.middlesexccl.com/