Despite a decent batting performance from our side, our bowling and fielding unfortunately fell short.

Highlights

A.Julienne:
•⁠ ⁠scored a wonderful half century which was a joy to watch both as an umpire and boundary line spectator
•⁠ ⁠innings featured a delightful array of cover drives, square cuts and pull shots
•⁠ ⁠nucleus of our innings and led strategically important partnerships with Suri and T.Lonnen

T.Lonnen:

•⁠ ⁠Club veteran promoted to No.4 and scored a crucial half century featuring a lot of graft and patience on a capricious wicket that NCC took advantage of to dry up scoring in the middle
•⁠ ⁠Built a strategically important partnership with A.Julienne to help set up a competitive total above 200 to defend

M.Spencer

•⁠ ⁠Elevated up the order and played a great cameo with some blistering shots square of the wicket
•⁠ ⁠Pick of our bowlers and put on a pace bowling exhibition when the conditions were most difficult
•⁠ ⁠Unlucky on a hat trick after taking our 1st 2 wickets in a row

C.Daley

•⁠ ⁠Put on an exceptional bowling display and worked very well with Spence in bowling partnerships
•⁠ ⁠Having an outstanding season and was unlucky not to take the final wickets in the death overs

L.Gray

•⁠ ⁠Great skippering, led from the front in both bowling and fielder marshalling under very difficult conditions
•⁠ ⁠Came on in the 2nd half of the NCC run chase, dried up scoring and took crucial wickets when the middle order was going "down town"
•⁠ ⁠Delivered terrific team talks during our drinks breaks

Conclusion

A tough loss, but we can learn from our mistakes and come back stronger in the next match.

Acknowledgements

1.⁠ ⁠L.Gray - Fantastic team talks both in person and on WatsApp subgroup before, during and after the game particular when heads were dropping towards the end of the day; pleasure to play cricket under his stewardship

2.⁠ ⁠Duray, Klara (partner of Liam) and Sophia (partner of Alex) - we appreciate friends/fans of the club coming out for support and encouragement
on game day

3.⁠ ⁠C.Daley - for the reminder to include the 5 penalty runs for their fielder picking up the ball with his cap

4.⁠ ⁠Chad - Warm welcome to the club, a nice debut taking his 1st wicket as a pace bowler and great company off the field

5.⁠ ⁠Northfields CC - As our skipper mentioned post game, we've enjoyed a rich history of friendly fixtures with them over 2 decades and they played the game in good spirits and of a decent quality throughout the day in both bowling and batting - deserved winners bouncing back from their 10 wicket loss at DSG a few weeks ago

Match report from Niraj Tailor