ADDRESS – Dulwich Sports Ground, Turney Road, Dulwich, London, SE21 7JJ
Match report away to Southbank CC 4th July 2021 ( Lost by 198 runs!)
Matt shines as Graces are truly tonked!
After the fine league win last week Graces ventured to south east London to play Southbank CC in Herne Hill with a few last minute changes to the line up. We welcomed Matt as he made his debut and occasional Gracey Hiten kindly turned out for us.
The venue is a huge ground with several pitches – the tired looking clubhouse isn’t totally open yet so we had to change outside. We helped the hosts by pushing the covers off the wicket which was revealed to be a little patchy but we’ve certainly played on worse. On display in the clubhouse are dozens of visiting team’s caps – including one of ours from our last visit!
First a big thanks to our loyal supporters Robert , Jim , Phil , Matt’s fan club Henry and Simon , Robert for his exemplary scoring not forgetting Michael and Matthew.
The toss lost we took to the field against a home team with a couple of veterans but mainly young looking. The threatening rain never materialised during the afternoon.
Skipper Stuart opened with Simon and Mamun and things progressed well during the first twenty overs with our hosts scoring 73 for 3 – Stuart taking a good catch in the deep off Mamun and a wicket each for Simon and Jamie. Graces were thinking that we could restrict them to under 200.
However we were in for a rude awakening as the 4th wicket partnership of Pedro Nelson and Choudhury then proceeded to attack our bowlers – we were a bit short of bowling and were to pay a heavy price as the occasional bowlers were shown no mercy as the batsman opened up – anything lose was dispatched to (or over) the boundary.
After 30 overs their total had reached 170 in what seemed no time at all – Pedro in particular showed a really good eye and a range of stylish shots as our bowlers were put to the sword.
Choudhury reached his 50 and retired (he didn’t look happy to do so!) leaving Pedro to blast his way to a century off only 61 balls including 10 fours and five big sixes before retiring. After these two had departed any hopes Graces had of containment quickly evaporated as numbers 6 and 7 just continued the assault with some cracking drives.
Their innings seemed to go on and on until finally the pain ended as they scored a mighty 292 for 3. They scored 122 off the last 10 overs! We’re not sure the last time we conceded such a daunting total – we’ll need to check the record books.
The pitch had shown a bit of variable bounce but otherwise had behaved itself. The tea break provided a welcome break to the shellshocked Graces. To compound our problems Scotty had to go to A&E with a damaged finger so we were down to ten without facing a ball!
Dom and Simon opened our reply – sadly our hosts were not feeling generous with their accurate bowlers taking 2 wickets for 10 runs after 7 overs. This set the tone for our innings as wickets fell regularly – only Matt (in at 3) looked comfortable as he played a fine innings helping to take us to something resembling respectability. Only Leo and Stuart got to double figures as we finally were skittled out for 94 in the 30th over. Our hosts are a friendly team and the game was played in a good spirit.
Jonners in at 6 dropped anchor to support Matt and at one point was surrounded by a really close fielding cordon resembling a final day test match in India!
Matt had looked on to get a deserved 50 until he mistimed to be caught in the covers.
So a rare drubbing for us but we kept going and well done to Matt for a fine debut innings.
Next week it’s back to the league as we visit Edgware CC