Chapel & WC CC vs Great Totham CC
A rearranged fixture from May meant Great Totham CC’s final game of the season was away to Chapel. Not a promising start to the day when Totham’s opening bowler had to pull out the night before due to a fractured finger (understandable). Also, despite only now having nine, one of Totham’s players apparently lost the ability to walk due to falling over the night before (not understandable unless in a wheelchair – which he is not). This meant Totham had to travel to Chapel with only eight, a more than disappointing start to the last game of the season. Due to this Captain Fantastic Chadwick said to Chapel at the toss that to get a game that goes beyond 2pm it would be best if they bat first, which Chapel did.
Totham had to start with seven as G Davis was to turn up half an hour late, this meant Totham had no opening bowlers, on comes Captain Fantastic whose first over went for only five, but ended up with figures of 3-0-37-0. Of course the Captain’s father opened the bowling at the other end, Chadwick Snr didn’t bowl badly at all but there were two very good batsmen at the crease and with gaps in the field everywhere bowlers were bound to go for a lot of runs. On came Rob Hewer, a few overs went by which were quite expensive but then Hewer soon decided to use the pitch and had the opening batsmen in trouble, especially when the Chapel’s opener on 50+ hit the ball straight to Captain Fantastic at long on who decided to try and catch the ball with his collar bone rather than his hands. Hewer also got the unluckiest LBW decision of the season when the Chapel opener stepped back and across in front of all three stumps and the ball hit him half way up the pad. George Davis came on to bowl, bowling quite well but struggled to find consistency and the lack of fielders didn’t help Davis’ figures. On came Owen McCausland for his Sunday XV debut, Owen ended up with
6-1-36-1, bowling tightly and more consistently than most. On comes the mini chairman (J Hay), instantly showing why he should’ve been brought on earlier, getting a wicket in his first over! Towards the end of the innings Archibald came on, his performance with the ball was as outstanding as his performance in the field, ending with 3-1-12-2 (despite his two wickets Archibald’s highlight was diving in to a ditch and consequently stinging nettles). Despite a better performance after drinks from Totham, Chapel still ended up with 347-4-40.
Totham’s batting performance can be summed up as poor. Chadwick Snr top scoring with 18 and T Logue hitting some lovely drives to end up with 17. Totham all out for 88 in the 21st over.
A disappointing end to the Sunday season for Totham in terms of availability and performance, but we can’t expect to perform well with only eight players. However, overall Totham Sunday team can be proud of their performances this year by finishing mid-table. A big thank you to all who played for the Sunday team this year!
Man of the Match – Ryan Archibald for excellent bowling, diving in to stinging nettles, chasing the ball in the field all day and trying to sweep a ball on middle stump.
