Darjeeling vs Desert Eagles

Friday 4^th October

With the summer heat still lingering the Tea Leaves took on the Desert Eagles at Sharjah. Winning the toss skipper Nick Harvey had no hesitation in forcing the Eagles into the afternoon heat. However the same decisiveness was lacking in the batting order, Noel went through 3 or 4 partners before striding to the wicket with Kym Harris. Noel looking resplendent in all white, Kym looking like he had just walked off a beach, set about watching the Eagles bowl to lines that would have been closer to the stumps on the next wicket. The first wicket was broken with Kym tamely chipping to midwicket with the score on 17 (10 wides), Greg strode to the wicket with purpose, allowing Little and Large to try and raise the total with the willow. After a breezy 18 off 9 balls, including 2 sixes, Greg edged to slip, score 47-2 (16 wides).

Next in was Dannie Rees who carried on where Greg left off but with Noel also finding 3^rd gear and the ball disappearing to all parts. A wonderful partnership of 101 off 53 balls was only ended when closing in on 50 Dannie was stumped for 42 off 26. Noel then upped his scoring rate again and after a quick innings of 1 from Nick Lloyd, Noel with another ton in sight perished for 85 off 56 (11x4s & 1×6). Nick C (6), Nick H (4), Chris Ward (10*), Hasan (3) and Jacob R (1*) took the score from 20 overs to 206 for 8. The crowd was also entertained throughout by on-going fielding competitions between Nick H, Wardy and the Raymond boys with Wardy being beaten every time, until he realised that the winners were always at the other end.

After a quick-ish turn around Darjeeling took to the field confident of defending 206; Wardy opened up from the Water Tank end. What followed was a display of aggressive and tight fast bowling and after a dropped catch in the maiden first over, Chris struck with his first ball of the third over bowling the opening batsman. The other opener quickly followed in the same over after a suicidal single to Nick Lloyd resulted in a run-out. In his next over, Chris picked up two more wickets with another clean bowled and a Greg Moses catch. Final figures of 4-1-10-3 sum up the great spell of bowling that it was.

After a slightly less effective 0-14 off 2 Nick replaced himself with Jacob Raymond who, despite beating the bat with regularity, did not pick up the wicket he deserved (0-15 off 3). Hasan picked up a wicket caught behind by Dannie Rees to leave the opposition 36-5 off 8.2. Before a mini revival despite the best efforts of the spin demon Kym; Kym and Nick L picked up a wicket a piece before the economic Ben Raymond bowled a decent 2-over spell for 9 runs. Kym picked up a second wicket and finished with 2-25 as the opposition closed on 103 for 8. Tea Leaves winning by 103 runs!

Darjeeling vs Loose Cannons – 21 September 2013 by Lawrence of Arabia

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.

Darjeeling CC v Loose Cannons Saturday 16th March 2013 – penned by Badger

Yet again another warm afternoon in prospect at the ICC Global Cricket Academy, Brian Scholtz as Skipper lost the toss as usual, and Darjeeling were doomed to the first 20 overs in the field.
With two of the Darjeeling boys still having failed to appear on time, Loose Cannons Skipper Richard Bradstock kindly lent the fielding side 2 able bodied men.
Brian took the new ball himself, hoping to bowl the ball a tad straighter than his previous wayward spell only getting shipped for 8 in the opening over, relying on youth and exuberance from the Academy End our junior player Jacob Raymond kept the ball straight, with the opening batsmen, Clint Birkenshaw and James Elliott-Square rotating the strike for the Cannons. CD Kotze came into the attack in the 5^th over hoping to stem the flow of runs, currently over 10 an over, and proceeded to gift the visitors a 22 run over. The Cannons were in full flow and all the bowling options that Darjeeling offered resulted in runs, Ben Jacob, Ash Banerjee, Stuart Matthewson and Gibbon Human all getting carted around the ground.
James Elliott-Square finally departed cleaned out by James Grisdale on the last ball of the 16^th over for a fluent 81, the partnership of 188 having done the damage, Ash Taylor joined Clint in the middle for a four over onslaught on the Darjeeling bowling, with the Loose Cannons blasting 94 to finish on 282 – 1 in their 20 overs, with Clint Birkenshaw 142 off 65 balls and Ash Taylor 31 off 12 balls.
Looking at the unenviable task of setting off chasing over 14 an over, Brian Scholtz went for a Jonathan Houghton – James Grisdale partnership hoping that these two could get Darjeeling on track in the run chase, the reality kicking in on the 4^th ball as Jonno was cleaned out by Nick Anderson. Chris Dommett strode determinedly to the crease and with his first scoring shot drilled a boundary; his fourth ball saw him waving his bat at a loose delivery from Tauseef Qadri to get caught behind. This brought together the high octane partnership of Brian Scholtz and James Grisdale. With a 21 partnership in full flow Brian found himself trapped LBW by Nick Anderson, bringing the left handed Noel Raymond to the crease for an 11 run partnership, before Big Gris going for a quick single found himself narrowly coming up short with Darjeeling finding themselves in all sorts of trouble at 39 – 4. With Jacob Raymond joining his dad at the crease the biggest of the afternoon’s partnerships was formed with 37 before Noel finally departed for 23, Ben Jacob joined his brother before being ruthlessly bowled by Bradstock. With the over’s diminishing and the tail looking very fragile wickets fell regularly with Jacob going for (9), Ash Banerjee(6) and CD Kotze (1) bought the unlikely paitring of Gibbon Human and Stuart Matthewson to the middle to try and avert a total humiliation with three and a half overs still to be bowled and with Darjeeling sitting on 90 – 9!! This pairing bought the third highest partnership of the day of 20, mainly gifted by wides with scoring shots consisting of two fours and a double. Darjeeling finishing well short of the target on 110 – 9 losing by 172 runs!!

Darjeeling CC v Choueiry Group Friday 15th March 2013 – penned by Badger

With a warm afternoon in prospect at the ICC Global Cricket Academy, Andrew Tideswell as Skipper won the first salvo of the day, the toss, and elected to bat.
Opening with Jonathan Houghton and Cameron Coles, it only took four balls for Jon to be netted and back in the hutch caught on 2. Cameron was the second to be snared for a three ball duck in the 2^nd over trapped LBW. Nick Lloyd and Greg Moses steadied the wobbling Darjeeling ship with a partnership of 87, with Nick cleaned out for 28. In strode James Grisdale looking full of purpose to blast a quick-fire broadside of 42 in 18 balls of his 60 partnership with Moses, Andy Tideswell still not having been dismissed at the ICC looked to add to his strong run. Greg was the next to get reeled in with Darjeeling on 175 in the 19^th over for 76 off 48 balls, Brian Scholtz followed the next ball for a Golden.
Tideswell & Nick Harvey put on a 14 partnership before Tideswell trudged back to the hutch for 20, Nick Harvey and Julius Mooney adding a further 14 partnership before Nick was cleaned out for 10, Julius hang on with Mohit (0) and Badger (1) adding little or no support with Julius finishing on 13 not out and Darjeeling floundering on a minnow of a score with 213 all out in 24 overs.
With the clock ticking down Choueiry had to turn round quickly to beat the tide of time that was against them. Baber and Bilal anchored themselves in the middle and resisted the lure of the Darjeeling bowlers Grisdale, Scholtz, Moses and Mooney coming up empty handed, putting on 92 before Bilal was hauled in from the first ball of Badgers first over with a sharp catch from Lloyd for 35. Baber managing to escape with a couple of huge appeals both for catches behind, Sameer got lured down the track on 17 by Badger to be snared, Hammad and Bilal saw the Choueiry boys home in the 23^rd over with Baber on 94 not out and Hammad 40 not out.
Darjeeling retired to the Pavilion to analyse their short comings and the power point presentations to follow by nets on Tuesday!!