Chigwell Cricket Club

Tour match III - Axminster

'Scoop' Hannant's match report:

14th June 2009

Well, Sunday was upon us. After two wins out of two the opportunity presented itself of making a clean sweep and winning all three tour games, a feat never previously achieved. Unfortunately there was a new captain on duty with absolutely no idea how to set a field other than to say "can you stand there, please"?

The captain, me btw, fortified himself with a hearty breakfast and another bracing swim. All was well with the world, nothing could go wrong. And it didn’t.

The Axminster captain and I didn't have a toss, we just shook hands on the format (40 overs) and who should bat first (them). The previous year they put out a team of varying ages but the victory we earned was quite tight so i was expecting the same this year, even though their team was made up of mainly colts. One thing they didn't anticipate, and whoever could, was the way our opening bowler could swing it. The ruddy cheeked, bespectacled mass that is Graham Wiskin trundled in from the pavilion end to take the wickets of the opening two batsmen, two fine looking stroke players but in the end quite incapable of coping with Mr. Wiskin’s unplayable swinging balls.

Because of the loss of the early wickets my job as captain was made considerably easier enabling me to shift the bowling around without too much anxiety of them making an unexpectedly high score. In dispatches I’d like to mention young Mr Wiskin who, after a bright start, fell to earth in the middle of the wicket with a seeming dislocation of the shoulder. Thankfully it wasn't and with a few beers down his neck after the game he soon forgot all about it. And I’d also like to mention Owen, just because I would.

Their innings was not without contention however. Two blinding stumpings by the poor man's Aussie were cruelly denied by the umpire, who was clearly blinded to them and by them, which did make the game at one point seem a little niggly but by the end of their innings a not impossible total of 168 was set for us to chase.

After another lovely, fresh tea Bradders and Nige were sent in to intimidate and frighten their opening bowlers. After that failed the cherubic seraph that is the poor man's Aussie was sent in to try and avenge for the umpire's previous indiscretions, and this he duly did with a blinding and belligerent ton, three cheers for the Ocker. But even in batting contention followed us, or was it just Dave the Kiwi that contention followed? Towards the end of the ton there was some very unsportsmanlike behaviour from one of their bowlers. With our score rapidly approaching theirs the opportunities for the ton were receding rapidly, especially since their 'bowler' deliberately bowled wides and no balls to try and stymie keeper Dave’s chances. Lots of grumbling and heckling ensued but this in itself could not aid Dave towards his ton, but we had a much better weapon. The crafty, wily, and sportsmanlike BGC was batting at the other end and as wide as the 'bowler' tried to bowl the ball was batted back with the BGC at some point having to stretch six foot on his off side so to do!

By the end Dave needed four for his ton but we only needed one to win. Thankfully a nice young man gifted Dave a ball that he could despatch to the boundary. The ton was his but more importantly the victory was ours.

The team could return home with victory ringing in its ears, a hundred per cent win for the team and a 100 per cent win for me.

This captaining lark.....it's all quite easy really, isn't it?

Rich

Strength and honour

Tour match II - Chardstock

13th June 2009

After about 30 minutes of driving around in one of Dagenham’s finest, Dave and I found the Chardstock ground, writes Nigel Barfoot. The pitch was pitched at around 10 degrees from leg to off and had a pretty short boundary. Nice.

After a quick toss with the opposition’s captain, he informed me of their weak batting line up and suggested we bat first to get more of a game. We batted first…

I faced, with the Chigwell talisman Rob Allum dropped to number 2. Frustration at not scoring an early six on the short boundary caused Rob to hit one straight to a fielder at mid off which was subsequently dropped. I did the same thing the next over then something strange happened. The score board showed 116 for no loss of wicket? Seagulls started talking to me saying there was no trawler to follow. Then the BGC was bowled making 56.

Steve Drabwell padded to the hilt entered the fray with a nervy start to then hit a couple of fours which settled him down. I hit my fifty then decided to go for a big six and got stumped. Richard joined the crease then departed before his Marlboro red was extinguished which caused a fracas in the changing room as Nick had to rush his box in. Steve was in hitting mood and managed to crack a huge straight six into the field next door. Very nice.

Dave came in next with Graham and Brad following in quick succession after Nick had scored 9. Adam came in after Graham and managed to score a quick 22 with three fours and a six. We finished on 215 for 8.

Dave the Kiwi rave opened the bowling with Ricardo Hannante and it wasn’t long before Dave bowled the #2 bat. Once the second wicked fell there was a huge Chardstock collapse with five ducks in a row, a few golden too. Nick had a huge amount of W’s and one M so had to be taken off so everyone got a game.

With 16 overs gone, we didn’t have much of a game to play with the score at 53 for 7. Rob O bowled 3 overs collecting 2 wickets and was replaced by Brad. Graham was brought on with everyone hoping to see the legendary swing that the Wiskas can produce. We didn’t have to wait too long with Graham beating the bat virtually every ball. At one point we had 4 slips and a gully due to the swing which was especially useful as Graham bowled one straight to 3rd slip.

Owen replaced Beef and picked up an amazing wicket caught by Ricardo at cow corner. Nice catch mate.

They finished on 106 all out so we could have an early beer which was jolly kind.

It's a fair cop..... but the batsmen (not society) were to blame.

Sunday 10th May 2009 Chigwell v Met Police.

It was a lovely sunny day (check out the new pics from the camera of RobbieO in the gallery area) as I pulled up at the Met Police ground on Sunday and most of the chaps were already gathered at the little changing room in the hope of another nice day out and another win for CCC.
Hmmm.....well, at least we got the nice day out.
The pitch looked its usual uneven surface when I went out to toss up with the Met skipper. He fancied a 40 over match, which I didn't really resist, so we made an agreement as he wanted to bat first and I wanted to chase (not knowing what's a good score on that pitch).
The Met batted pretty well for their home conditions , although weirdly they didn't look that good but the final total of 181 was totally decent.
Roger and James S took the new ball and after James settled they both bowled nicely (as did most of our team - only Richard (the sun god) and Adam (the keeper) didn't bowl!)
Highlights were Zarg's return - right on the money after a long winter, Owen once again in the wickets ...and Graham S bowling late on taking 3 wickets for 7 off 2 overs!!  Welcome to Chigwell, G!
Overall we did the bowling right and fielded well and energetically and we all seemed to have a nice time:-)

Onto the batting:  To summarise, I would say we didn't really adapt our batting to the local conditions and paid the price.  Several of us fell early on playing the way we would on a good surface (this strip was very two-paced and the bounce extremely variable) and gradually we slipped further behind the required rate, lost more wickets and finished 50 short of the total.
It was fun to watch the late order playing some aggresive shots as there was no draw possible.
181 was a completely realistic target so it's a shame that as a batting unit we didn't really have our act fully together.
If I hadn't tinkered with the basics of the batting order (as someone suggested) we might have done better, but it's also clear that us in the top order should have employed a more sensible shot selection given the conditions!!
I reckon that we could have pushed the field much more than we did too and picked up more singles?

Anyways, the Met were a decent bunch and it was good to see lots of supporters on the boundary...... and we had an interesting tea - deep-fried sausages and chips!

Seeya.

R.x

League news

South Loughton recorded an emphatic win against Chaseville on Sunday. They must be stopped! Report by Andy Battle on the Middlesex and Essex Invitation League website here.

Early season report... Top of the league!

Chigwell's Cricket season has well and truly started... and we're currently top of the league! We've played 2 friendly matches and 2 league matches already with no problems from the weather so far.

Ok, so we started the season off with our first Middlesex & Essex Invitation League match against South Loughton. This lot always seem to be a bit difficult to beat and this time was no exception. We lost the toss and were inserted by SL on an overcast afternoon and began our innings with, for me at least, a sense of early season unpreparedness. Anyways, we perhaps under-achieved as a batting unit as we mostly seem to do on the SL ground and only managed to post 128 by the end of the 45 overs (I felt little chance of gaining a win by batting on over the 45 - and risk losing our 2 batting points in the process). SL duly knocked the runs off and the win was theirs... We managed a couple of bonus points out of it.  Showers were not working!!!

2nd match we were on our way to North Mymms (just north of South Mimms;-)  a charming ground very well appointed and looked after beautifully. Lovely outfield to dive around on if necessary!  Very nice tea also.

I lost the toss and NM decided to bat.  Wrong decision for them I'm pleased to say as some tidy bowling (props to Richard) kept them out of the runs for long enough to make them forget how to score any and the scoring moved extremely slowly. Owen was also brought into the 'attack' later on and notably took 2 wickets (caught by RobO and the sadly missed Imran). NM had to declare on 130 as time was moving on and, after stuffing ourselves on the fulsome spread we had no real problems achieving the win. Dave got a half-century and Chas a breezy 20 odd...   The showers were working well!!

Next up was Pacific - a team I play for regularly so I hoped we would be able to put up a good battle! 
We won the toss and I decided to bowl as I thought the chase would give us the best chance of winning. As a team I would say we didn't bowl our best but Pacific had some very good batsmen out that day so we did well to do as well as we did!  They declared on 248 for 8, squeezing us a little for time.
Tea was a rustic affair served from the galley and eaten outside on the benches. No cup of tea available!!!
We went about the chase with intent and all in all we did pretty well as a unit (I made a punchy ton, ensuring some free beer for my team-mates!) finishing up on 200 for 9.

Now here's the thing....... if we hadn't gone for 56 extras including 39 wides we could very easily have won the match.  39 wides???!!!!!!  Ridiculous. Get a grip Chigs.

Which brings us on to our 2nd League match and season debut on our home ground - the beloved Old Chigs.  We were playing Hadley Wood Green and hoped that this match could provide us with the league win we desperately needed after our loss to SL.  .... It did!

I won the toss and had no hesitation in putting HWG in to bat (as they have been known to stodge the draw on more than one occasion;-) on a decent looking wicket. It all went nicely to plan with all our bowlers doing the business and keeping any runs at bay. In fact, we did so well that HWG decided to bat over the 45 overs as they hadn't reached the 125 required for the first batting points. I've only ever seen that once before in a league match...  RobO took a decent 5-for (ensuring some free beer for this week!).

After another crap Old Chigs tea, myself and Dave bashed out the 133 required without much drama (apart from a bit of a comedy catch attempt apparently?).  It was a shame no one else was required to bat as we had both Harvey and Ross in the side for a nice change, and we still haven't had a chance to really see what Ahsan can do yet.  The showers stayed hot just long enough, and beers at the Chigs were followed by beers at the Nightingale (which were followed by beers at Bipasha ...and a very fine Vindaloo strength Dhansak). 

This match, win, and social was, and is, dedicated to our cricket and football buddy Imran, who's not around anymore..... 

Strength&Honour

R.x

A win vs Hadley Wood Green!

The Squad
Originally uploaded by Chigwell Cricket Club

A picture of the winning squad (+ a couple of little extras). There are one or two more new photos by Rob Orange in the Flickr gallery too.

New Season - New Players

Well, here we are on the brink of a new season and enjoying some lovely pre-season sunshine! I'm looking forward to taking on the captaincy from the other Rob and hope we can continue to have fun and achieve good results as we have done in previous years...cheers Bob! 

Firstly I'd like to welcome new members Graham and James Sibley to the club and hopefully Ahsan will decide to join us permanently in the next couple of weeks too. 

If anybody out there knows of any potential new members please pass our details on.... we can always do with new members and the occasional guest player too.  It would be great for the captaincy team if we can get good availability from our members this year so we're not scratching around still looking for players come Fri/Sat!

It's been a decent turnout at nets and everyone is looking good - it will be excellent to turn that enthusiasm and talent into solid performances and a positive atmosphere on the field:-)  I hope that we'll all enjoy doing our best to achieve the best for the team as a whole and get some early wins under our belt too!!
I believe our first match is a league fixture so we should do our best to hit the ground running - let's get there early to harden those hands up with some catching practice etc.... Catches win matches!!

Ok, enough crap from me. I'll see you all soon and I'm taking availabilities in advance for all matches so let me know asap.

Looking forward to it!

Rob.x

New fixture list published

Fixtures for 2009 are now here on the website. More details of the new League to be announced soon.

How long is a piece of string?

Last Sunday, Rob O and Nick went up to Old Chigs to measure up the sightscreen in preparation for a new sheet of wind-permeable material to be fitted before the season. Exciting stuff!

The King is Dead. Long Live the King.

At the AGM on 16th January Rob Orange stepped down as Captain, with Rob Allum taking his place. Brad Davis and James Laycock make up the the Vice-Captain team. Graham continues to count the beans while Nick moves back on to the Committee as lay member responsible for tour fixtures and the exciting new Sunday League set-up that will be trialled in 2009. Five clubs have signed up for the experiment:

Chaseville
Chigwell
Hadley Wood Green
Mayfield
South Loughton

More on this later. In the meantime, club nets are taking place at Forest School on Wednesday evenings at 9.00pm. All members and potential new members very welcome.