St Lukes 1st XI
St Lukes batsmen set up comfortable victory
The Beddington Village Oval provided the perfect setting for St Lukes CC to
begin their AJ Sports Surrey Cricket League Division 2 2007 campaign.
Captain Hardwicke won the toss and decided to make first use of a pitch that
looked as though it would give some assistance to the bowlers.
St Lukes started brightly with Haslehurst driving and cutting with aplomb.
The score had reached thirty when Hardwicke pushed at a wide one from Carr,
slightly over balanced and was smartly stumped. This brought St Lukes
debutant Craig Streets to the crease who settled down quickly, playing some
fine lofted shots down the ground. Unfortunately this also turned out to be
his weakness; as Streets caught a leading edge and was safely pouched at
extra cover for a breezy 17. Krishna arrived and departed in fairly quick
time, still finding time to cause the normal amount of controversy in his
brief innings of 12.
With the score on 70-3 Fawad Omer joined Tim Haslehurst at the crease,
after a slow start the pair moved through the gears and the scoreboard
started to tick over, assisted by some excellent running between the
wickets. After a year out of the game Omer showed his class by clipping the
ball sweetly off his legs and dancing down the pitch lofting the ball
straight down the ground on a number of occasions. Haslehurst brought up
his 50 with a delightful hook shot down to the fine leg boundary and
dispatched the next ball out of the ground. In all Haslehurst and Omer added
140 for the fourth wicket, before Omer was caught at long on for a fine 81.
In all St Lukes totalled 225-6 off their allotted 45 overs with Haslehurst
remaining defiant on a ‘Boycottesque’ 87 not out.
A total of 225 was always going to be too much for Beddington with the St
Lukes opening bowlers in a miserly mood. Karl Quinn found the early
breakthrough, but they were unable to capitalise as the Beddington batsmen
played and missed on numerous occasions with Des Heynes being particularly
unlucky.
The introduction of Michael Krishna put the game beyond Beddington as he
picked up 3-31 off his 10 overs. St Lukes continued to look sharp in the
field, with Richard Bent always on the look out for a run out opportunity.
Unfortunately they were unable to push home their advantage and claim all
ten wickets, despite the efforts of Blatt (1-24) and Joneja (1-9).
Beddington limped to 120 -6 off their 45 overs and St Lukes claimed their
first victory of the season.
Man of the Match: Tim Haslehurst