20th August vs Ponies

We hadn't played against the Ponies for quite some time, and this time we had to bat first. Thorpe was out for this match, so his place was taken by Raddis who would bat with Pax. This allowed the other three pairs to remain intact.

Phil and King batted first, and started with Phil being bowled from the jackpot ball after he moved down legside with the ball and it hit him on the legs then onto the stumps. From there they slowly built the runs, but also faced many extras. After a runout in the first over the score was sitting on -9, but they managed to get the score back to zero after two overs. When Philbert hit a five, and then King hit a four they decided to steal a run to give him five, the score was at 20. A stumping from the next ball after King took forever to try and get back into his crease, and a single to end the over saw the score sit on 16. Philbert made 15 from 10 legal deliveries, but lost two wickets and faced 3 wides, while King made 11 from 9 legal deliveries, but lost one wicket and faced 2 wides.

Cap'n Bob and Mahstar came in and made a better start then the previous week with 1 run from the first two balls. The first ball Mahstar faced came off the bat and hit him in the cheek. He probably should have taken more time to recover as he was runout the next ball after leaving the crease to soon. They had -3 after their first over. The next over saw Bob hit two 4s which helped gain 15 in the over. Bob started the third over with another four runs. Bob was runout after hitting down the ground. That is something that needs to be considered more with the straight shots. They made 5 runs from the over, and another 13 from the fourth over after Bob hit a five on the final ball and faced a couple of wides. The partnership was 30, which is way above what they had been making this season. Bob made 22 from 11 legal deliveries, but got out once and faced 2 wides. Mahstar made 8 from 8 legal deliveries, but got out once and faced 2 wides and a noball.

Bruce and The Don scored mostly in 2s, with Bruce hitting one 4 and one 3. The problem they had was with wickets, with The Don stumped once, and Bruce runout twice, and stumped and bowled once each. The final ball was a runout after attempting to steal a run with Bruce watching the wrong end not realising the ball was coming to his end. The partnership was 10, with Bruce making 16 from 13 legal deliveries, but lost four wickets and faced a wide, while the Don made 11 from 8 legal deliveries, but got out once and faced 2 wides.

Pax and Raddis scored fairly easily with mostly 2s, a couple of 3s and a four. Raddis was runout twice and Pax was out from the 3rd ball rule. The two balls before Pax was given out were down legside only marginally inside the line. They kept the score between 60 and 70 of most of their innings and finally ended with the score on 70 after a single on the final ball. The partnership was 14, with Pax making 18 from 14 legal deliveries, but lost one wicket and faced a wide, while Raddis made 9 from 9 legal deliveries, but lost the two wickets.

The score to defend was 70 runs, which overall wasn't enough for us on the night. We needed another 30 or 40 runs, to beable to give it a real fight.

We had a good start with King getting two wickets in the first over for -4 run, but Mahstar's overs conceeded to many runs with 18 from the 2nd over of the innings and another 17 from the fourth over. Raddis bowled the third over gaining a wicket with Bruce taking a catch and conceeding 4 runs. The pair made 35, which was already half way to the target, this made it very difficult for us to contain them so we could win.

The second pair added 38 runs which put them ahead of the target and made it easier for the last two pairs. The overs were bowled by Philbert (7), Bob (6), Bruce (10), and Pax (15). We got just one wicket in the pair with the catch in Phil's over.

The third pair consistently lost wickets which kept them under 80 runs. The Don (6) picked up a wicket clean bowled, Raddis (-5) got a team hattrick with two catches by The King and a runout by Bob in the middle, The King (8) didn't take a wicket but bowled tight, and Pax (-4) bowled the last over to the pair picking up two runouts from the hands of the Don and Raddis. They ended up making 5 runs.

The last pair had no pressure on them since they were still ahead of the target. Cap'n Bob (11), Bruce (0), Philbert (8) and The Don (11) bowled the overs. Bob got a runout and Mahstar took a catch in Bruce's over, Phil picked up a runout in his over and in the Don's over. This pair hit a few 7s to end up making 30 despite the wickets.

The final score was 70 to 108. Our next match is vs the Black Hill Steve's at 7:30pm.