WEEKEND REVIEW - JUNE 23
By Simon Heaney
MIDDLESEX CHAMPIONSHIP CRICKET LEAGUE DIVISION ONE
Bessborough 1st XI 98 all out
Birkbeck College 100-8
Birkbeck College won by 2 wickets
MIDDLESEX COUNTY CRICKET LEAGUE DIVISION THREE
Wembley 2nd XI 152-7
Bessborough 2nd XI 151 all out
Wembley won by 3 wickets
1987 CRICKET LEAGUE DIVISION ONE
Bessborough 3rd XI 68 all out
South Hampstead 4th XI 179 all out
South Hampstead won by 111 runs
1987 CRICKET LEAGUE DIVISION FIVE
Swamibapa 3rd XI 83 all out
Bessborough 4th XI 39 all out
Swamibapa won by 44 runs
Bessborough’s woes continue
All four Bessborough sides slumped to demoralising defeats on Saturday. The only excuse being that the ill-timed wedding of our esteemed webmaster James Wheeler robbed our line-ups of some in-form players such as Andy Carr and of course Wheels himself. Star all-rounder Ian Barrie was also unavailable to make matters worse.
Seriously, congratulations to Wheels and the new Mrs Wheels AKA Gemma. The happy couple are now honeymooning in the U S of A, watching baseball no less (who says romance is dead?).
Back to proper sport, Bessborough 1s were put in to bat by Birkbeck College and soon found themselves in trouble as opener Ramesh Gunalan was caught in the slips without scoring. His replacement E. Thavalinkam was bowled for 1, leaving Bessborough in a precarious state at 7-2 off 8 overs.
Captain Dan Hawes and William Grogan did their best to get the side back into the game with a 52-run third-wicket partnership before Grogan was out caught on 21 in the 27th over.
Hawes was out for 36 the next over and thereafter wickets fell with predictable ease. Akshay Hirani (15) and Nirav Ghantiwala (10 not out) at least can be proud of a stubborn last wicket partnership of 19. Bessborough finished on 98 all out after 45.2 overs.
A tight opening spell of bowling by Ghantiwala and Hirani limited Birkbeck to just over two runs per over and in the eighth over Hirani was rewarded with the wicket of Asad, bowled for 2. The same bowler then removed Zeeshan and David cheaply to leave Birkbeck on 32-3, giving Bessborough hope of an unlikely victory.
Despite more cagey bowling and regular wickets Birkbeck scraped over the line, ending up on 100-8 thanks mainly to a steady 33 from opener Furqan and Qasier’s 24 not out.
Hirani once again took the plaudits with his bowling, finishing with figures of 3-17 from 9.2 overs. Gunalan bagged 2-16, while Neal Patel and Rohan Karkhanis matched each other with 1-22.
A fine half-century by 2s skipper Phil Bush (54) couldn’t save Bessborough from defeat against Wembley. Adil Parker (24), Mitesh Vyas (14) and Gajan Ghandi (20) were the only other batsmen to get double-figure scores as Wembley’s Iftikar ripped through the side, taking 7-53 from 17 overs.
Bessborough were all out for 151, a total boosted by 31 extras.
Wembley looked to be coasting to victory as Shukat and DeSilva put on an opening stand of 74, but three wickets for no runs hinted at a collapse that unfortunately for Borough did not materialise. Wembley reached 152-7 after 32.5 overs. Nitin Modha (3-32) and Varsha Patel (2-27) were the standout Bessborough bowlers.
The 3rd XI were humbled by the swing bowling of South Hampstead’s Fazal who picked up another seven-wicket haul as Bessborough collapsed to 68 all out chasing 179.
The 4th team fared even worse as they could only muster a paltry 39 runs against Swampibapa. Opener Saagar Vora (14) was the only Bessborough batsmen to offer any sort of resistance as the host’s spinner Vinit ripped through the team, taking 7-17.
Such a poor batting performance contrasted with a very decent effort in the field as Bessborough looked to have carved out a winning opportunity by getting Swamibapa out for 83 in 20 overs.
Tom Newland excelled bowling uphill with 4-9, while the returning Majid Abassi looked sharp with 3-30. Ravi Vyas (2-10) and Dominic Baxter (1-4) can also be proud of their efforts.
Looking at the scorecards for all of Saturday’s matches, 30 out of the 40 Borough wickets that fell were either bowled or LBW, suggesting that our batsmen need to have a serious rethink about how to play the straight ball.
Hopefully, everyone at the club will learn from their mistakes and help the club collect some much needed points, starting this weekend.