A bright April day saw Pacific's up and coming skipper James Smiffy Smiff bat first and Chris Atkin, in his penultimate game for the club before touring Europe and making his Return to Oz, batted with the sort of freedom that has eluded him in recent seasons, helped by a couple of dropped catches of course.
With confident Vincent Croft making no impact, burly Aussie Kurt Rademaker run out by a direct hit from the boundary and a mid-pitch collision and a pulled hamstring, and batting legend Jon Webley only just breaking into double figures, the rock in the middle order was Brighton Frenchman Toby 'Chicken' Chasseaud, who joined Atkin with a machine-gun half century in their 95-run partnership.
Toby was late for the game having forgotten his bat, coaxing usual fellow opener Pete Hollman into driving him home to get it.
Hollman's other useful contribution to the game was to guide the team home from lower down the order than he is used to, despite Conrad 'Nipples' Chandler writhing about on the floor like his rib was broken (it wasn't, merely a torn muscle - "Where's the nearst hospital? I can't breathe") and eventually retiring hurt.
The home team's score of 266 looked especially good after super-swingers Webley removed 2 and Atkin 1 of the top four for only 20 runs.
However, a brutal century from T Green and his double-century partnership with opener Nix Patel saw the game swing violently in the visitors' favour. Green lost two balls among the smattering of huge sixes (two over the pavillion, two into nearby gardens) he heaved on the way to his 129, including an unforgiving 38 runs off the 2 overs from 9-year-old Luke Hollman, who didn't cry, bless 'im. Although dropped catches were abundant (we shan't name names for Hollman and Atkin's sake in particular), including the centurion at least twice, but shouldn’t take away from some brutal batting.
With a Pacific defeat looking assured, it was a great surprise when Oli Haill, remodeled as a slow left arm spinner, darted one under Green's bat and bowled him. In tandem with the hamstrung Rademaker, the pair kept it very tight and as the Saracen nerves began to show removed 5 wickets between them, with the Aussie also completing the winning run out on the very last ball to seal a 3-run win.
Pacific XI:-Chris Atkin, Luke Hollman, Toby Chasseaud, Oliver Haill, Peter Hollman,*James Smith, Jon Webley, Conrad Chandler, Aroon Korgaonkar, Vincent Croft+ , Kurt Rademaker. |
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