Match Report

On Wednesday night, we hosted the St Clements Strollers team for an evening T20 game. The captain, Matt Dipple, won the toss and elected to bat first on what seemed a pitch rather like that of the 2019 World Cup final, green. Howard Lancaster and Gus Floyd were sent out to begin the MSCC innings and after hearing all about his previous performances, Slogger Lancaster slashed one straight to point within the first over. So Harry Way joined Gus at the crease and runs started to flow even with some incredibly high speed bowling coming from the Strollers attack. After Gus received one that struck rather low for an LBW, Jamie came in and soon after Harry retired having scored his 30. Throughout the rest of the innings, MSCC continued to score at a decent rate, especially considering some of the bowling, often making a long descent down towards the pitch. Some loopy bowling dismissed a few but a fine partnership between Ahmed and Matt to finish the MSCC innings with a total of 126. 

After a quick turnaround, we were on the pitch ready to go. Hamidullah and James Lyon opened up, both bowling tight lines and creating chances and soon Mr Lyon was rewarded for a beautiful inswinging delivery that pegged middle stump back. Soon after, a great piece of fielding dismissed the second opening batsman who seemed rather unaware he was so far out of his crease. Shaan dismissed the number 3 and wow, I could do a whole paragraph on the celebration but to keep it short, I think he’d been watching some Ronaldo highlights. Then came some strong batting from the Strollers as runs began to come even after some tight bowling from Sam Norley and Shaan Singh. Then, with some injuries among the team, Gus was put on to bowl some “very sub par” (his words) off spin but from the other end, captain Matt tried and was very much succeeding in keeping the Clements side from reaching their target, with two wickets and a run out from Gus after some tight bowling lead to a silly single. So, with some good keeping from Jamie and solid fielding from everyone else, St Clements needed 18 off 18 as we entered the final part of the game. Everything to play for. However, after what was some good batting from them and some less than good bowling from Gus, they only needed 10 off the last 12. Captain Dipple was unlucky to have two good shots played off his bowling leading the Strollers needing 1 off the final over, yet their main man had retired. Up stepped James Lyon to bowl the last. Another brilliant piece of fielding from Tim House, who had an injured finger, created yet another run out and then a good yet ironically unneeded straight ball was bowled by James to dismiss their Number 11, bringing back one of their retired batsmen and a wide ball gave St Clements Strollers the victory after a very closely fought game. 

Gus Floyd