3rd & 4th XI Match Reports - Saturday 12th May 2018

3rd XI Home v Abingdon Vale 3s
After last week’s last-ball 2-run win we were looking forward to a less stressful game at home to Abingdon Vale. Winning the toss and electing to bat first, and with a great “on paper” top 8 batting order it was reassuring to see openers Blake Richardson (54) and Lewis Marstin (32)settle into their work with regular boundaries, and they raced to a 90-run partnership inside 18 overs. Richardson brought his 50 up with a 6, but then couldn’t keep a late-cut down, and could only guide it to gully. After watching the openers make hay, Greg Woods was unlucky to get a peach first up, bowled by the consistent Newman (15-2-40-3). Marstin was next to fall, also bowled by Newman, but with a platform set and an experienced middle order to come, we felt confident in setting a competitive total, but Vale had other ideas as their spinner Evan’s proceeded to take 5-13 from 10 overs, and we subsided to 119 all out in 36 overs, with no other batsman scoring more than 7 runs.

Vale’s Captain is generally their gun batsman, and he had top scored for them the week before, so we were indebted to his colleague for running him out, Jamie Ruthern-Stuart and ‘Keeper Jason Duckworth combining with composure beyond their years to action the dismissal from point. Marstin’s game continued to go well with a contender for catch of the season at 2nd slip off the sharp bowling of new signing Iwan Roberts, and with Adam Claydon taking 2-fer with his left-arm seamers (Ruthern-Stuart and Duckworth taking the catches) the game was evenly poised with Vale 51-3 from 15 overs. With the door open, up stepped the evergreen Anthony Prior-Wandesforde. Bowling with precision and consistency, APW bowled FOUR consecutive wicket maidens, and finished the game with outstanding figures of 10.4 overs, 4 maidens, 5 wickets for 15 runs, winning the game with a nervy caught-and-bowled for the last wicket, with Vale only 5 runs short!

Having won the first two games of the season from the jaws of defeat thanks to two excellent bowling performances, we look forward to seeing what happens when we bat well in the same game! Click here for the full scorecard

Justin Hemming, 3rd XI Captain

4th XI Away v Abingdon Vale 4s
Looking at the points awarded on the Cherwell League website this morning (Shipton 6, Abingdon 10), it's not a true reflection of the day. AV won the toss and inserted Shipton on a hard, dry wicket. Despite the early loss of the skipper’s wicket, Howard and Graham soon pushed the run rate up to 6 or 7 per over with a liberal smattering of boundaries before Howard was caught on 22. Nat Carter (U15s) was in at 4 and not only played a very useful supporting role for Graham but produced some great shots of his own - most notably straight and cover drives and two pull-shot boundaries. Nat was dismissed immediately after the drinks break on 21. Next up was Dingle senior who opened his account with back to back sixes and went on to score a speedy 31 before being caught at mid-off. Around this point Graham Nelson reached his ton, retiring shortly after. After that there was a fairly speedy rotation of batsmen but we lasted into the 45th over before being dismissed for 237 (192 off the bat and 45 (!) extras).

After tea, with the ball swinging nicely, three maidens from the skipper got us off to a good start, with Ruairi Newman (U17s) at the other end. However, six overs in and the rain started. We managed four overs in wet conditions before calling it a day. Not the fairytale ending we wanted but that’s cricket.

Jon Woods, 4th XI Captain

Updated 18:35 - 30 Aug 2019 by Justin Hemming