Hamro Foundation Essex Cricket League Premier Division, Saturday May 29
Week Four in the Hamro Foundation Essex League and I finally
got to see my first game of the season, and the weather had finally played ball
and turned out beautiful for the first time this season, the previous three May
weekends had been very un-cricket like so it was nice to watch a game in the
sunshine and some heat.
I was over at Billericay Cricket Club as they hosted league
leaders Chelmsford in the Premier Division, the hosts had lost their only game
that had managed to finish with the other two rained off, whilst the visitors
had won both their opening games before last weeks postponement, and the hosts
won the first little battle out in the middle when they won the toss, and they
elected to bowl first. This proved to be last time they won anything in this contest.
Chelmsford’s opening batsmen Jack Sterland and Dan Hagan
made the most of being put into bat first as they put on a mammoth opening stand
of 224 before the hosts finally made the breakthrough when Hagan was caught by
David Houghton off the bowling of Adam Marchant for 80, but Sterland carried
his bat for a brilliant unbeaten 159 from 144 deliveries and it meant the hosts
were set a daunting 278 to win from 45 overs, a tough task against a decent
bowling attack.
The hosts needed a good start if they were to have any
chance of chasing that target down, but lead by Aaron Beard, Chelmsford saw him
nip out openers Aron Nijjar and Nathan Khelawon with just five runs on the
board, and the hosts never looked like they would mount a challenge, and it was
a case of how many bonus points the hosts could get with the bat.
When they slid to 119/8 it looked like they may get none,
but then a marvellous unbeaten 34 ball fifty from skipper Andy Smith, who had
come in at number nine, got them up to 186/8 in their 45 overs, but agonisingly
three runs shy of a third bonus point, but at least they grabbed two from this
one, although the contest was never really one after the visitors had posted
such a large total.
Here are the scorecards and bowling figures from today’s matchup:
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Chelmsford Innings
Billericay Bowling Figures
Billericay Innings
Chelmsford Bowling Figures
Here are some snaps that I took during the day too: -
