A hot balmy afternoon awaited both teams at the ICC. The pre-match discussion centered around the Cannons good record on grass and Darjeeling’s makeshift bowling attack. Danny Rees made his debut for the club and proudly hung up his Welsh towel in the change rooms for all to see.
The Cannons won the toss and no surprise, batted first. Darjeeling opened up with Etienne and Danny. The opening batsman (in particular Clint) took advantage of the quick outfield and some fullish deliveries and started hitting boundaries at will. Captain Ash decided to turn to spin, first, Kim (aka Warney) who got some turn straight away. Unfortunately, the batsman took advantage of the few balls that didn’t get a chance to turn, and at the first drinks break (7 overs – it was hot!!) the Cannons were no loss for around 70-80.
Finally, a change in luck for Darjeeling, the Cannon’s opener smashed a straight ball at Clint, who took a blow to his right hand. The other opener retired shortly thereafter suffering from heat fatigue. Captain Ash turned to Browny who bowled 4 very tight overs from one end, building up some great pressure.
The turning point of the game was when Ash brought himself onto bowl. Firstly, taking the prize wicket of Clint after Andrew took a juggling catch at mid-on. Ash then proceeded to destroy the Cannon’s middle order. Whilst some of the “Cannons” were a little “Loose” with their shot selection, all credit to Ash who finished up with a “michelle pfifer” – 4 overs 5 wickets for 12. Sackers also bowled a couple of tidy overs and took a wicket. The bowlers were well supported by the fielders (Cameron, Nathan and Noel behind the stumps etc.) and after looking like scoring 220, the Cannons made a sub-par score of 163.
Darjeeling opened the batting with Danny and Browny – who made a great start to the run chase with an opening partnership of over 100. In fact, the only problem was working out exactly how much they both scored – as the scorers from the Cannons team had got slightly confused for some reason with our openers (despite only one wearing a helmet). Anyway, Danny finally retired with heat fatigue after scoring a well made half century on debut. Sackers was next in and unfortunately got a straight one first up and was on his way. Noel then stepped up and with Browny scored some quick runs together and sometime in the 19th over we had reached our target with the loss of only 1 wicket. All credit to Browny who batted throughout the innings and remained around 80 not out – having been on the field for the entire match.
A good win for Darjeeling – which we celebrated with a few pints with the Cannons at the Ernie Ells club.