By Sunday Specialist Match Correspondent: Timbo Logue
A warm Sunday, sore heads from the previous nights card roulette at The Bull; Great Tothams Sunday XI found themselves away to West Bergholt. Pre game TFC Breakfasts for the skipper Joe Davis and his opening bat partner Owen McCausland being the highlight of their days.
A keen Bergholt side awaited the Totham faithful, cones out, running fielding drills, on a Sunday no less; Totham had 4 players on time. After the bulk of the side arrived, skipper Joe went out to do the toss, winning and deciding to put the side into bat first. The openers (Joe D and Big O) padded up and ready to go out to the middle on what would be most definitely a batting day.
A strong start with Joe leading by example, timing the ball well, a level head, playing some gorgeous strokes would see the boys see off the opening bowlers. With Owen’s wicket falling we would see 2nd XI captain Stu come in at 3 for his first Sunday game of the season. Strong batting the two of them would see Totham move past the 50 mark. With the skipper looking in form, he would eventually bottle his half century, out for 48, Totham 77/2 off 17.
With 3 pairs of brothers in the side we would see the oldest pair out together in the middle. Stu and Chris, Tubby and Rhino; Rhino looking in good nick, hitting the ball hard and along the ground. Totham would trundle their way up to 110/2 off 25. Unfortunately for the Rhino, a hamstring injury would mean running between the wickets became extremely tricky. Fortunately for him, he had his brother out there; understanding, he knew of the issue. Soon after would see a little tickle from Stu and a quick shout of “YES”, tubby; much like a 20th century steamboat motoring his way down the wicket. Unfortunately a bit of temporary memory loss for the 2nd XI Captain would mean he had forgot his brother couldn’t run quick singles; he would have to turn and go back, to his demise, not only did he move like a steamboat, he also turned like one, ran out for 13.
Totham would now rely on an injured Rhino and a youthful middle order. In comes DQ, big hitter, top winner, bowled first ball. In next would come George Davis, handy with the bat, confident he could add to Tothams total, also out first ball. With their 1st change bowler on a hat-trick in the last over of his allocation, Totham would need someone with a level head, who could play the straight ball, a sensible batsman to deny the Bergholt bowler of a hat-trick. In comes Timbo Logue, straight ball, completely missed, lbw, 2nd duck of the season, thanks for coming.
Having been on 110/2 totham would find themselves 116/6. A classic collapse and a few runs from the tail would see the Sunday XI post a score of 130 All Out in 28.5 overs.
Tea’s as we’re all aware aren’t a thing this season. Big O brought me a nice meal deal, Chicken + Bacon on wholemeal, chicken satay skewers and a Fanta fruit twist.
The Totham Faithful would go out to try and defend their total. A strong bowling attack would see DQ and GD open up, GD bowling extremely tight and trying to get the job done. A wicket for the younger davis, the field trying to limit the runs; not bad for the opening seamers. 1st and 2nd change would be young Wheels of Steel and Ed “Value” Vale, both bowling very well, some extremely questionable keeping from Timbo behind the stumps would see both of them denied of caught behinds, value would rely on hitting the stumps for his wicket and young Tommy Wheeler forcing the bat to lob one up to DQ who caught it with ease.
It wouldn’t be enough unfortunately despite a bit of miscommunication from the Bergholt bats allowing captain Henge to throw the ball into Timbo’s gloves, finally taking one clean and completing the run out. Bergholt would surpass Tothams earlier batting efforts to score 131/4 off 28.1 overs, winning by 6 wickets.
Despite the bun result there were some highlights and good performances, there were no byes from timbo, Young Ruben having to field 60 overs as Bergholt only had 10, some funny chat as ever from PQ. Great to see Ed, George and Tommy bowling well, Rhino batted well for his return to cricket in 2021 but overall I think Henge provided the goods with the bat and a further contribution with the run out, MOTM for me.
I’m unavailable next Sunday so hopefully the match report will be better and less catches will be dropped behind the stumps. Best to move on from this game and go again next week.
