Month: May 2022

Nazgul v Chatswood Gypsies 29th May 2022 @ Moore Park 8

By El Presidente

I think we lost the toss and were sent into the field, which lines up with our usual plan. Really good bowling all-round, the fielding was excellent as well, especially from the young guys (who have clearly been trained well). Unfortunately, the catching wasn’t great – the skyball our nemesis once again.

Gazi (3 overs 1/13) claimed the first wicket with an LBW leaving the Gypsies 1/1. Lewis Beard claimed the next wicket with a lethal throw, moving to his right with one stump to aim at, leaving the batter well short of the crease, and wondering where that thunderbolt had come from given the bright blue sky overhead. It was a run out worthy of appearing in cricket.com.au highlights packages. Abhijeet Balaji rattled the stumps with his third ball, and bowled full and in the channel consistently, ending the day with 4 overs 1/6. Bryan and Will both bowled out their six overs in miserly spells going for 0/11 and 1/11 respectively.

The bowling honours clearly went to Chinmaya Madan who tore through the Gypsies with precision – hitting the top of off stump, then the top of leg stump, then an LBW that was taking the top of middle, and ended with a startling 5/12 from five and a half overs. Stiff resistance from opposition number six “Fifty” with 29 helped the Gypsies to 94 all out.

With a small target often being hard to chase down, we opted to open with the steady and guiding hand of John Wright (27), paired with the dashing flair of Lewis (3), who was given out caught behind in the second over 🙁
Gazi (10) made his presence felt (in more ways than one) with a couple of nice shots but was also caught behind, leaving us 2/18 after 8 overs. Enter Arjun (28), watched on by very proud dad, Govind, who put on a 20-over 50-run partnership with John, before both were run out in consecutive overs. Ajeet (14*) opened his scoring with a glorious slog sweep for 6 followed by a boundary, this 12 run over breaking open the game, leaving 6 overs to get the remaining 11 runs for the win. Boundaries from Will (4) and Bryan (4*) saw us home with three overs and wickets to spare. Well done everyone, especially to debutants Arjun with a patient and controlled innings of 28, and the star of the day Chinmaya with the first five wicket haul of the season.

Kingsford Nazgul v Summer Hill

Sunday 1st May, Moore Park 7

By Isaac

With some of the nicest weather Sydney had offered in the better part of 3 months, Kingsford got their Winter Cricket campaign off to a start on Sunday. El Presidente managed to wrangle together just enough players to qualify as a viable team. Five familiar faces and one debutant took to the field to play a slightly lopsided game of 6 v 9 against Summer Hill. Losing the toss and being sent in to bat, Dinesh and John Wright got off to a steady start. They scored steadily for the first 9 overs before Dinesh decided he’s seen enough. He hit 20 runs off the 10th over, including three 6s, quickly seeing him to his 40*. Isaac was in next, and inspired by Dinesh’s batting, kept the score ticking over. He reached his 40* with a towering 6 over the toilet blocks in the last over before drinks to see Kingsford 0-115 at the break. Solid batting from John Wright (25), McCredie (9 & 14), and debutant Pushkar (16) saw the runs continue to flow. The retired batsmen came back in at the end but didn’t manage to add too many runs in the final few overs. Isaac (48) was eventually caught on the boundary, and Dinesh (58) made his half-century, but was out shortly after. All out for 188. A good total, but with only 6 fielders defending it might prove tricky. Managing the bowlers was going to be tough, as each of the 6 players had to bowl exactly 6 overs each. Dinesh opened the bowling and got the team off to a sold start. Taking the wickets of both openers and finished with 2-17 from his spell. Gazi took over and kept the opposition on the back foot. He beat the stumps and bat by centimetres on at least a dozen occasions and was unlucky not to have more wickets. He did take the wicket of their most dangerous batsman who attempted one too many big shots and was caught on the mid-off boundary, and also took three catches himself. Mal took two catches behind the stumps, as well as a sharp stumping off John’s, bowling, and then swapped out the keeping gloves to have a bowl. He rolled through the lower order with his darting off-spin, taking the final wicket to finish with figures of 3-8 and restricting Summer Hill to just 92 in their chase. A very good start to the season. Because everyone played so well it was easy to forget that we were 3 players short the entire game. Thank you to Pushkar for filling in for us. Hopefully, we can get more players for the rest of the season and keep the winning streak going.

Some comments from the fb site:

Smokey: Sorry, did i read that correctly – Gazi TOOK three catches?
Dereck: Great write-up Isaac. I came here to post the same thing as Smokey !?!
Gazi: Dereck it was completely fluke for me hold on to 3 catches and not dropping one. It was one of the day we were happy playing cricket with 6 against 9. Isaac with his masterful batting bowling and captaincy took us over the line. Should not forget I took 3 catches.
Declan: Great match report Isaac and brilliant win with only 6 players

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