Penn Street vs Ley Hill

Penn Street CC 246-4 (C. Russell 89, J. Tollerfield 75: J. Yerrell 3-20) beat Ley Hill CC 137 (J. Legdon 1: R. O’Hagan 4-17) by 109 runs.

On a grey winter’s afternoon in mid-August Penn Street were invited to make first use of a new pitch, which still retained traces of dampness after the previous day’s rain. Sensing a need to blend caution with aggression captain for the day Matt Hewlett nominated Chris Russell and Steve Smith to face the youthful Ley Hill new ball attack.

A solid start was what was needed and a solid start was what PSCC got. Whilst the bowling was at times challenging, it was also wayward and both batters were able to pick up easy runs against the opening pair, aided by their captain’s steadfast refusal to place any fielders anywhere that Smith tried to hit the ball. When the change bowlers appeared pretty much the first thing that one of them did was to bowl three successive wides and then drop a caught and bowled chance off Russell. Indeed, so untroubled did the pair seem that it was something of a surprise when Smith was suddenly bowled for 26, bringing the partnership to an end with the score on 91.

There was a palpable sense of relief amongst the fielders, but it was soon dispelled by the arrival of Josh Tollerfield, who clearly decided that the prevailing run rate of over five an over was far too slow and began setting about the bowling as if they had criticised his footwear. He soon overtook Russell – himself no slouch but showing a slightly greater interest in blocking the occasional delivery – and raced to his half-century in only 31 balls. Russell was not far behind him and together the pair had added 102 to the score in just 13 overs when the Ley Hill captain made another one of his strange decisions and brought on a left-arm seamer who turned out to be their most talented bowler. Tollerfield flicked the first ball behind square, but unfortunately straight down the throat of the fielder standing there. He departed for a well-made 75.

Adam Tattan was the new man in and, despite already complaining about how much his body hurt, showed commendable defence against anything bowled at the stumps. At the same time, though, his inability to hit anything aimed wide of him did rather impede the scoring rate. Indeed, both he and Russell so struggled against the quick left-armer from the Pub End and the left arm spinner now operating from the Wood End that runs almost dried up entirely. Russell eventually became so frustrated that he bunted the ball straight to mid-off, out for 89 when a hundred appeared his for the taking.

That brought the reassuring figure of Rob Sutherland to the crease, who immediately upped the scoring rate by edging his first ball for four. Some quick sprinting between the wickets nudged the rate even higher, even if it did leave Tattan somewhat out of breath. Sutherland was eventually bowled by the penultimate delivery of the innings, at which point Jeremy Knox arrived to prove that this batting lark really isn’t that difficult by smashing the final delivery to the boundary. With that, the Penn Street innings closed at 246-4.

The Ley Hill innings began with Captain Hewlett issuing an interesting directive to his bowlers of “I’ve decided that we are going to do this in four over spells, so don’t be surprised if I take you off even if you have just bowled a double wicket maiden”. The poor perplexed Secretary wandered away to his favoured fielding position of ‘somewhere the ball won’t go’ wondering what this ‘double wicket maiden’ was and deciding that it must be something his captain had found on one of those Special Websites For Lonely Men that he had heard so much about from other teammates.

First to receive their allotted four overs were everyone’s favourite Australian schoolteacher Sam Saunders and everyone’s favourite Bournemouth University student Jonny Barnett. Both were swiftly among the wickets. Saunders was just too quick and accurate for the teenage Ley Hill opener and demolished his middle stump, whilst the other batter quickly found out that the languid nature of the Barnett run-up doesn’t mean that you can take liberties, as he lobbed the ball straight into the hands of Vish Goundar.

Things didn’t get a lot better for Ley Hill after that. Their number four, described by his captain as ‘emphatically not a cricketer’, did manage to thump Saunders for four, but then also found his middle stump cartwheeling after another hoick across the line went wrong.

At the other end the number three batter had been in for almost half an hour but had faced fewer than half a dozen balls. Fortunately for him, Saunders’ four overs were up and the captain had thrown the ball to the Secretary in an effort to prolong the game and/or avoid being the one who had to go home and feed the dog. Unfortunately for the batter, he had a wild hack at the first gentle, loopy delivery and skewed it straight to Tollerfield at mid-on.

Ley Hill’s hopes now rested with their wicketkeeper and the left arm quick, both clearly competent cricketers. The former took a particular liking to Goundar’s attempts to impersonate Ish Sodhi (‘Vish Sodhi’, anyone?) by bowling leg spin (that was what it was meant to be, wasn’t it, Vish?) but showed a marked reluctance to get up the other end and face the pie barrage that the Secretary was unleashing. Instead it was his teammate who had the misfortune to face a delivery which hit a stone, coin, jelly baby or some other obstacle on the pitch, turned slightly, took the edge and was snatched at the second attempt by Captain Hewlett at slip.

The next wicket didn’t advance Ley Hill’s cause any further, as the ball after playing the sweetest of straight drives for four the new batter walked straight past another gentle Secretarial offering and the middle stump took its third battering of the day. However, that then led to the best stand of the Ley Hill innings. The Secretary having exhausted his four overs the batters took out their frustration on Knox and Goundar, so confusing the poor old PSCC captain that he gave one of them five overs and the other only three. In that time the wicketkeeper passed 50 and the score advanced by 42. Then came a moment of brilliance.

Goundar bowled. The number eight batter swung mightily. The ball soared towards the long-on boundary and the road. Saunders sprinted to his left at long-on, threw himself full length and somehow plucked the ball out of the air and held on to it as he landed to pull off one of the best catches seen at Penn Street.

Somewhere amidst that partnership Captain Hewlett had bowled a couple of economical overs of his own. The Ley Hill ‘keeper now realised that he had to go on the attack and hit Hewlett for consecutive boundaries, the only time in the innings that that happened. Hewlett responded by digging the ball in shorter. The batter tapped the delivery down with soft hands, then watched in horror as it gently trickled on to the stumps. The middle stump, loosened by Saunders’ assaults upon it earlier, wobbled just enough for a bail to fall. It was a somewhat unfortunate ending.

An ending not just for the batter, but for the Ley Hill scoring. Hewlett decided that he had a point to prove and ripped out the new batter first ball. The Secretary was invited to bowl the next over and saw the first ball of it chipped over Tollerfield’s head, whereupon the fielder turned, dived and caught the ball inches from the turf to end the innings at 137, with the last three wickets going down for no runs in four balls. If that wasn’t embarrassing enough for Ley Hill, it meant that the Secretary – a man whose previous contributions against them had amounted to no more than a broken thumb and a comedy run-out – had taken 4-17 and now had two of the five best PSCC bowling performances this season. Some people should be ashamed of themselves.

PSCC: Steve Smith, Chris Russell (wk), Josh Tollerfield, Adam Tattan, Rob Sutherland, Jeremy Knox, Vish Goundar, Matt Hewlett (c), Richard O’Hagan, Sam Saunders, Jonny Barnett