Scorecard

Hertford II v Berkhamsted Cricket Club 1st XI on Sat 26 May 2012 at 1.00pm
Berkhamsted Cricket Club Lost by 4 wickets

Match report In the words of Michael Fish it was a scorcher. Both the weather and the cricket. With England toiling away at Trent Bridge against the Windies, Berkhamsted were making the long trip to the far reaches of the county to Hertford. A delightful ground and pleasant opposition.

The skipper looked at the pitch and despite his past experience of completely miscalling the conditions, the white lines and cats’ eyes down the middle of the wicket confirmed it was a road. 525 runs in total in the match and only 8 wickets (2 of which were run outs) said it all. The skipper won the toss to the delight of his team mates and elected to bat.

Berkhamsted batted first and after an assured start from O’Neil and debutant Preedy, two quick wickets brought Schaw and O’Dair to the crease at 44/2. What happened next reminded the skipper of one warm day over in Chipperfield some years ago where he and another Schaw put on 230 runs together breaking all manner of records (I had to mention that as I did nothing all match except win the toss). Unfortunately that was nothing compared to this unbroken 200+ run partnership. It was like the Chinese philosophy of yin yang. The dependable Luke together with the explosive Gus. Fantastic batting from the pair and great to see Gus scoring his first (of hopefully many) hundred off only 72 balls. Too many times the Hertford bowlers dropped too short and had to watch the ball sail into the car park over mid-wicket. One has to worry whether the roofs of their mouths got sun burnt.

With last week’s match still in the memory, the skipper declared with Gus on 146 and the team 261/2 off only 44 overs. A generous declaration given the opposition 56 overs to chase. On a very good batting wicket we needed all the overs we could get to bowl the opposition out.

Ben opened up with the other debutant Joe who bowled like he had been bowling for the first XI for 10 years. Nerveless, accurate and pushing the odd one through to get some life out of the pitch, he was very unlucky to only pick up one wicket. Indeed it was the disease of drop catches again that blighted our fielding display (I will hold my hand up to one of them). Nevertheless a good debut from the 16 year old and no doubt a star for the future.

The pitch was becoming more lifeless as the match wore on however we were never able to sustain long periods of pressure by bowling the odd “4 ball.” To be fair the opposition batted well with their opener Hurrell the fulcrum of their innings. Had he been caught on 1 or 80 things might have been different. In any case the team kept at the task with enthusiasm and energy in what turned out to be a nail bitter. Despite two wickets falling in the last over the opposition managed to get over the line with 3 balls to spare.

Again we shouldn’t be disheartened. 16 points gained and many positives to take out of the game. The opposition captain even remarked after the game that we should have no worries challenging in this division.

Berkhamsted Cricket Club 1st XI Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
2nb 7w 11b 1lb 
for 2 wickets
21
261		        
Jez O'Neill b Cooper 18 51 41 3 43.90 1 1
Gareth Preedy b Kumar 14 39 37 3 37.84
Gus Schaw Not Out  146 119 94 16 9 155.32
Luke O'Dair Not Out  62 107 94 7 65.96
James Wyatt  
David Smith  
William Steed  
Ben Beard  
Joseph Atkins  
Huw Barnett  
Stephen Dight  

Hertford II Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Kumar16.0175175.004.69
Ferdenzi10.025600.005.60
Cooper4.0026126.006.50
Sharma2.001400.007.00
Chastell8.004600.005.75
King3.002100.007.00
Hurrell1.001100.0011.00

Hertford II Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
5nb 4w 1b 2lb 
for 6 wickets
12
264 (55.3 overs)		     
Riddle Run out  44
Hurrell lbw b Wyatt 112
King b Steed 15
Benford ct O'Neil b J Atkins 31
Sharma b Dight 45
Pavey Not Out  0
Short run out O'Neil 1
Cooper Not Out  4
Kumar  
Chastell  
Ferdenzi  

Berkhamsted Cricket Club 1st XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Ben Beard7.023500.005.00
Joseph Atkins12.0252152.004.33
Huw Barnett6.012600.004.33
Stephen Dight15.3174174.004.77
William Steed4.0020120.005.00
Gus Schaw8.003300.004.13
James Wyatt3.0021121.007.00

  • Umpire :
    Richard
  • Scorer :
    Sarah