Sarisbury At Lord's
By Ray Hammond
Down West, 5 March 2007
By this stage, Secretary Penny was the focus of the campaign as the "Man from Lords" emailed her with details of the four regional finals. Hampshire clubs come under the West Region. She had less than a week to organize the transportation of the team plus supporters to the Somerset CCC County ground at Taunton. This time, it was agreed, that a coach was the right answer, so a 50 seater was duly booked for departure from Sarisbury Green at 9.00 am on Sunday 4th March. The games were due to start at 3 pm so somewhere had to be found for lunch as well. Penny eventually located a pub/carvery not far from Taunton who when phoned, were happy to accommodate a coach load of us.
In the meanwhile, the club made the sports pages in both local papers with headlines like "THE GREAT INDOORS BECKONS AS SARISBURY EYE DATE AT LORDS" and skipper Simon had his words of wisdom quoted in The News at regular intervals. It was all getting rather serious now, though when everybody piled on the coach on the Sunday morning we had all been waiting for, it seemed for all the world like an outing to the seaside! Lunchtime found us all queuing up for our carvery lunches handing in our vouchers in exchange for a very substantial roast . In Dom's case it was more than substantial, it was enormous! At least equal to 2 other meals! Pete was more subtle. He forgot to hand his voucher in, went round again and ate another complete meal! Hardly surprising that as we drove through the outskirts of Taunton, both star eaters were fast asleep!
The opposition were Bridgewater,(Somerset), Swindon (Wiltshire) and Werrington(Cornwall). All, of course were Premiership sides and looked trim in their club tracksuits etc. We were just as smart though this had involved a certain amount of borrowing to get the whole squad looking the same. The word "squad" was entirely applicable now as Simon had decided to appoint his Dad, Les, as "7th man" and it has to be said that Les had an immediate effect on the morale of the opposition. All four clubs were warming up, bowling a few balls, doing a few stretches etc. (in Pete and Dom's case, trying to wake up after their culinary excesses!) Les, casually attired in jeans, trotted up and bowled one of his trademark beautifully straight deliveries and hit the single stump full on. He then queued behind the others and bowled a second delivery which also hit the target! Les duly repeated this feat a third time while the oppositions were looking on in some trepidation. Les, of course, was not celebrating the feat, just shrugging his shoulders and behaving as if it happened regularly. Looking on from the balcony one of the officials of Swindon CC remarked on how good the bowling looked. I made a point of telling him that Les wasn't actually playing. "He's not really that good" I remarked, trying to appear off-hand. He stared at me for a moment, trying to fathom whether I was lying, then wandered off, deep in thought. He was seen later checking the team list and after confirming that Les was, indeed, only the reserve, he rapidly advised all his club of this, hopefully undermining their morale before play even started!
The pitch was an excellent playing area, large, with a good surface, not unlike the Rose Bowl so the team looked comfortable from the word go. Any nerves seemed to be still overwhelmed by the sense of being on an adventure which nobody had anticipated at the start.
In the first semi final, Werrington scored 95 for 5 without looking very convincing and Swindon lost 3 wickets while knocking off the runs. Nobody from Sarisbury was at all concerned that Swindon posed much of a threat, but of course, they had to play Bridgewater first! The Bridgewater fans were listening to some of the very cocky banter going on among our boys and I heard one muttering "Typical bloody Hampshire" It occurred to me that there was a slight inferiority complex on display here!
Even so, batting first, Sarisbury did not start at all well! Bondy was bowled for just 6 in the 3rd over. Pete joined Simon and they picked things up but the skipper himself misjudged a single and was out for 21 out of 41 in 5 overs. Then it was 50 for 3 off 6 when Pete was also run out as things began to get dodgy. Dom, however was looking comfortable and Joe came in and set about the bowling with gusto, hitting and running with no apparent fear of failure. Another run out, this time Dominic, for an excellent 21 left the score at 89 for 4 half way through the 10th over. Keith came in and the 11th over only saw 5 runs scored. We all knew that 97 off 11 was not enough! Joe rescued things somewhat in the final over and a flurry of runs including a spanking 6 took Jumbo to a superb 33 not out in a total of 114. Personally I didn't think it was enough but the Bridgewater body language indicated that they reckoned they were up against it. Nevertheless Bridgewater started ok and were 15 for 1 off 2 overs. Opener Windsor was brilliantly stumped by Simon off Joe Humby but the other opener, Davies, looked very confident and competent. Joe continued to hold centre stage however and his 3rd over removed the number 3 batsman (superbly caught by Bondy) and yielded just 1 run as the boys raised their fielding game to a point that the opposition had clearly not expected. This included a characteristic under-arm throw run out by Keith! Now Sarisbury tightened their stranglehold and the scoring rate went down to a point that completely baffled the Somerset boys. Pete went for just 7 an over and Keith only 6 an over. He bowled one really bad ball however, a rank long hop which the batsman smashed straight at the face of Pete who was very close in at mid off. Pete caught it! Exit batsman Hewson for nought! Joe, still the star, had figures of 2 for 14 to go with his great innings. Dominic had actually been hit for 14 off his 2nd over but came back to bowl the final one with the game already won as Bridgewater needed to score 38 runs off it with only 1 wicket left. The batsman, opener Davies, managed a 3 before Dominic clean bowled him for a fighting 40 out of a total of 79 all out.
Typical bloody Hampshire....
A short breather, then Simon won the toss and elected to bat first against Swindon. And I have to say that Sarisbury looked the more confident team of the two. In summary, the first innings started well , keeping up a rate of 10 an over. Then they slipped a little behind, down to 56 off 7 overs before the 8th over was smashed all round the court for 22 runs. After that the boys kept up 10 an over, finishing on 126 for 5. Bondy was caught for 15 during the 6th over and Pete joined Simon keeping things steady for an over or two before blasting themselves both to excellent retirements. Then came a collapse as Dom (6 off one ball!) Joe (first ball duck) and Keith (7 off 2 deliveries) were in and out without slowing down the rate at all. With Simon and Pete back in, the scoring rate kept it steady. Simon was out caught for a superb 33 and Pete was obviously tempted to go for the big hits but he kept cool and batting through to the end, ended on 29 not out.
With a first innings of 126 for 5 the team clearly felt that they were going to win. For one thing, Sarisbury were the only side to have passed 100 in the competition so far! The spectators? Well one at least was feeling the pressure. Ian Clark, who had only joined the club a short time before but already a committed Sarisbury man, was so overcome by nerves that he went and sat outside in his car! Ian said to me that he kept thinking "This might be their only chance of getting to Lords. How come it doesn't seem to bother them!"
Joe and Dom started bowling tight with the fielders, as always, pouncing on anything in reach. Even so, the score kept up 10 an over. Then Pete took a good catch off Joe and immediately afterwards Dom threw sharply in to get the second wicket, run out. At 2 for 28 off 3 overs all was in the balance. Now Swindon's Spencer came in and made the game look easier. His partners, however, were not so comfortable. Pete took another sharp catch off Joe, 35 for 3, and that over of Joes, his third, went for just 2 runs. Now the panicking Wazir, going for a suicidal single, was run out, Dom calmly removing the bails. Pete came on to bowl and 3rd ball, clean bowled Swindon's number 6 to put the score at 38 for 5 in the 6th over. Now Spencer was now on his own and he promptly hit Pete for 2 threes and a six. At 51 for 5 off 6 overs, for the first time, some of us began to worry. Many times has a solitary batsman steered a side home by simply picking off the runs without risk and, frankly, Spencer looked more than capable of doing it. Keith's first over was good and only went for 7 and at 58 for 5 off 7 overs I remembered to breathe again. But Spencer wasn't finished. He hit Pete for another 6 and took 15 off the over. With the score at 73 for 5 off 8, a Swindon win was a distinct possibility. The Wilshire supporters were yelling now and we were very quiet.. Keith's 2nd over and another six! Then 3s and a 2 resulting in 12 off the over and 85 for 5 off 9 overs. Oh lord!
Pete's last over, and this time Spencer couldn't get hold of the bowling. Four deliveries for just a 3 and nothing else. There were 14 deliveries left and Swindon needed 35 to win. The rate was getting too high and they knew they had to go for it. So they tried for that fatal single and Pete, following up, gathered the ball and threw the stumps down from about 10 yards. Run out!
Sarisbury had won!!
We are going to Lords!
Somebody go out and tell Ian!!
Pandemonium, bedlam, whatever you want to call it, broke out and it's impossible to remember the rest of the day clearly. Just two items stick out. There was no beer on the bus, we just hadn't thought of it! So we wandered Taunton until we found an off licence. The proprietor must have thought it was Xmas as we bought enough to celebrate all the way home. Then, inevitably, some time later came the need for a stop and the driver unerringly found a rather dark lay by with a public loo off the A333. As we all disembarked there came a blood-curdling scream from the ladies as Stephanie Orr came face to face with a rat!!! Stephanie survived but the rest of the details escape me!
