Friendly Matches

Captains Report

A most enjoyable season of friendly games, again with several lost to weather. The strength in depth that the club is beginning to enjoy was illustrated by the use of 34 players in 11 games, 24 bowled of which 22 took wickets. 13 of the players used are juniors at the club, ranging from Patrick Knightley, aged 12, to Amrit Singh in the U-17s. We also welcomed John Moller and Alex Newman as new players to the club, both of whom reached the 1 XI during the course of the season. In total only 7 players took part in more than 5 games with 14 playing on sundays for the first time.

Despite these constant changes to personnel, we managed to win 5 out of 8 games, the consistency of winning the toss resulted in only two games where we took to the field first. The lowest score acheived in this was 162-4 in the first game at Stocksfield where Balu Dorani (52*) scored his first 50 for the club in partnership with Roger Loxley (35*), the opposition only reaching 83-10, with Mark Wheldon taking 4-16 (after 7-24 for the 2 XI the day before).

Stuart Taylor was again the mainstay of the batting, reaching 50 in 4 out of 6 innings, and 46 in another, Balu, John Varley, Alex Newman and John Moller also scoring 100 runs for the season. Andy Denyer also reached 100 runs for the season with an, unbeaten 51 (his first 50) in the defeat to the University Staff, despite a partnership of 124 with Stuart, where their 184 proved unreachable.

Eglingham handed us our second defeat, or rather we gave it to them on a plate. We scored 179-7, and then after Chris Barlow had taken 4-26 to leave them at 126-8 with 6 overs we gave away the game with 2 overs for 38 runs, step forward Stuart who had 20 of them, it can't all be praise!! He did however score 50 in the match.

Morpeth was the 3rd defeat in a row, again having scored 186-8, Stuart with 50 again and Alex Newman with 47 in his first game showing some powerful hitting at better than a run a ball, he also took 2-18 as they cantered to victory courtesey of the Aussie pros century.

We then reached the part of the season that can only be described as Tommy Oliver's with honourable mention to others. During the first half of the season he took 4-103, in the next 3 games he took 13-51. After amassing 201-4 against the Kings School Old Boys, John Moller (52) and Stuart (67), he took 4-31 as they reached 144-9, eight of the team bowling, Chris Barlow producing figures of 6-5-1-1 (the one was a wide) and a welcome return to form from Dipak Sran.

This however proved to only be the beginning. Ulgham the following week chose to bat first and were all out for 97, Tommy with the remarkable figures of 7.5-4-5-5. Amrit Singh took 3-35 and Patrick Knightley made his debut with a good spell of bowling and a wicket, (which he followed up in the next game), the game was effectively over, Simon Raw and John Varley socring 60 before being separated.

Stocksfield followed, we topped 200 again when batting first, 64* from Alex Newman, batting at seven, included 5 sixes, people may be less keen to park their cars by the scorebox next season when he's playing. Some quick calculations from the scorebook suggest that this score could have taken at most 28 balls!! While he was at the crease we put on 69 in the last seven overs. Tommy added 4-15 to his collection, while Balu Dorani took his first wicket for the season, took two catches and scored 28 runs.

Genetics were the final scheduled opposition of the season replacing University Staff. The weather intervened when they were 77-8 chasing 191-5 with 13 overs to spare, a Duckworth-Lewis victory?? John Moller (42) and Neil Pinnock (44*) top scoring. Patrick Knightley made a confident 17* on a pitch that was providing awkward bounce to much more senior (and taller) players. He also took 2-14 before rain brought an end to proceedings.

We then managed to gain some extra fixtures, K.S.T.O.B away ended before it really started with only 5 overs bowled. The last fixture against Genetics, was on a damp, soft practice pitch at Ponteland, our 110 proved just too small, and resulted in defeat by 2 wickets in the penultimate over. Andy Roberts scored 24, and took 3-6 in his first senior bowl, John Moller and John Varley also picking up 2 apiece.