Hampton Wick Royals CC Bushey Park
Match report away v Hampton Wick 4th May 2025
Graces pipped at the post!
A quick check revealed that this was our twelfth visit to the always welcoming Hampton Wick – it’s become a highlight amongst our fixtures. Since the fire that destroyed their fine pavilion 2 seasons ago they’ve been using some posh porta-cabins with a marquee for the tea and bar area – hopefully next summer it’ll be all completed.
Graces were glad that they’d packed two jumpers as despite the sunshine it was a bit chilly.
Jesant skippering Graces for the first time lost the toss and we fielded. As ever the hosts had a mix of youth and experience – another first for us (I’m pretty sure) was that we featured 2 father and sons; Mendis and Leno plus Patrick and 15 year old Konnor who had driven down from Great Oakley – as had Henry.
A generous LBW decision and a smart low catch from Vik soon saw our hosts 12 for 2 in the 4th over and our heads were up. Left hander Richard Phillips and captain Freddie then patiently rebuilt the innings taking the score to 81 at the 20 over drinks break – Freddie led a charmed life as he was dropped at least 5 times in the afternoon! A nice catch from Leo saw Phillips out for 48 and the partnership finally broken – 114 for 3 in the 26th over.
Rahul in at 5 then then took the attack to Graces with some nicely timed aggressive hitting and it looked as if the game was getting away from us – 250 plus looked possible. We rallied and kept the total to 239 for 5 – Freddie finishing on 91 not out making the most of our catching generosity!
Mendis picked up 3 wickets for 33 with Qudrat 1 for 23 , Vik the final one
The teams then retired to the cosy marquee to have a rare tea and warm up.
Jesant and Henry opened against the pacy youthful bowling attack – Henry was tempted by a wide one and edged to the keeper , sportingly walking in the first over. Mendis then looked good taking the score to 30 in the 8th over when he skied a catch to mid off.
Leo joined Jesant and these 2 looked in control as the runs started to flow – it took an excellent delivery to bowl the skipper who made a nice 35 – (81 for 3 after 17 overs) This brought Qudrat in at 5 who immediately took the attack to the bowling. Leo had found his timing with his trademark hard hit crunching drives between mid on and mid off. Drinks in the 20th over saw us total 126 for the loss of 3 wickets.
The watching Graces then enjoyed an entertaining partnership between these two as the hosts rotated their bowling in the hope of stemming the flow of boundaries. Leo and Qudrat had other ideas as any loose deliveries were punished – 174 after 25 overs.
It looked like plain sailing until Qudrat mistimed a pull in the 30th over and was caught for a quick fire 38. 210 for 4.
So we only needed 30 more runs with 6 wickets and 10 overs left – surely victory was a foregone conclusion!
Leo then hit another crunching 4 to reach his maiden century (he’d come close a few times before) – the next ball saw him bowled! It had been a really great innings with only a couple of half chances offered.
Hampton Wick’s tails were now up after the 2 key wickets and bowled annoyingly well with few poor deliveries offered. Dom looked solid enough to take us to the win but was bowled! Konnor mistimed and was caught! A mix up saw Patrick run out and after Vik was LBW we only had a single wicket left with 7 needed off 3 overs. Leno and Jonathan were the last pair.
A few runs were scrambled until in the last over 5 were required. Graces were biting their fingernails!
A single , two dot balls then Leno tried to hit it over the infield but was caught! – we had lost by only 4 runs!
A great game of cricket with lots of positives and some fine performances.
Everyone retired to the marquee for drinks – many thanks to Rob for his immaculate scoring.
Jonners
 |
|