The inspired and inspiring captaincy of George Holden, and the benevolent presence in the side of Club President Peter Hockin, as well as the usual welcome from Colin Poole and all at Crakehall CC, helped us all to have a very enjoyable game, as always, at Crakehall.

George won the toss and inserted the opposition, and although they immediately started hitting some boundaries, having Keith Egerton’s spinning wiles to open the bowling with George, led to the dismissal of many of Crakehall’s young, fit, and crack league batsmen. 3 clean bowled by Keith.

George took himself off, saving some overs, put on Howard Elgot, who immediately got another wicket; plumb LBW with his very first ball. George himself then got a spectacular direct hit run-out, (with a throw reminiscent of Samit Patel’s at T20 Finals Day the day before). Howard then appeared to have bowled another Crakehall batsman, but it was with an over waist-high full toss, so ruled out as a no ball. However, he was soon back among the wickets with a very good low catch by Geoff Lawler (his first Romany catch) and another LBW.

Crakehall were 95-7 (better than we’ve normally achieved against them mid-innings). However , despite some steady and not too expensive bowling by the rest of our attack, Andrew Moore, Peter Hockin, Charlie Read, and your humble scribe, several hard catching chances or half-chances weren’t quite accepted- ( great efforts by Scott Munro, and  young Charlie Read among them) so Crakehall recovered.

George came back and bowled Crakehall veteran Colin Poole, but Crakehall closed on 188-8 in their 30 overs. John Surtees had done an excellent keeping job, as keeping is never easy at Crakehall, especially on the kind of dull, grey day it was throughout.

After an excellent tea, as usual Duncan Read gave us an excellent start with hard-hit boundaries,  but was bowled for 14, others found it tougher but Scott Munro made 10, and George made a superb captain’s innings 38. He was then, ironically, himself a victim of Crakehall’s own direct hit run out.

We were behind the required scoring rate but John Surtees hit several boundaries in making 24, before being unluckily bowled off his pads. It was difficult to deal with Crakehall’s opening bowlers brought back, and the target was out of reach, but to salvage some pride by not being bowled out, Geoff Lawler (4 not out) and your scribe (10 not out) held out to the end at 135-7.

(Crakehall then kindly volunteered to bowl an extra over so young Charlie Read could have a hit, which he enjoyed, and he hit some good shots and wasn’t out.) – Pleasant drink, as always, in the village pub opposite, after the game.

Nick Hawkins
4th September 2017