Honiton 26Jun05

Kings Sunday game of tour was against a Honiton side that declared themselves weakened by players missing due to a cup match in Somerset. Kings themselves were missing Steve Smith, their first choice wicket keeper who was missing his first game of the season, and also Gordon Young. In the absence of Smith, Dave Perry came out of retirement to take over behind the stumps.
Having won the toss Honiton asked Kings to bat first in a 35 overs match

Against some of the best bowling they had faced for several weeks Kings openers of Miller and Perry sensibly took a few overs to get used to the pace of a dry wicket. However by the 7th over they had found their way into the pace of the game and took 27 from the next three overs. Both batsmen were in good form, with Perry once again looking good on the drive whilst Miller was quick to punish anything with width. Fifty was posted on the board without any great alarms and the two batsmen continued to build a solid base for a reasonable score. However Perry was starting to struggle with a 'dead arm' and decided his best approach was to go on the attack. However having just communicated his intentions to his partner, Miller then edged behind and was caught for 23 (70-1). Perry continued in his attacking vein with his new partner Evans. But when Perry called for a quick single to mid off Evans was caught ball watching and ended up short of his ground as he desperately scurried to the strikers end (82-2).

A typical fluent innings from Simon Pipe of hard hit boundaries helped the score past the three figure mark. Two superb cover drives brought Perry within sight of his fifty which he duly brought up with a trademark quick single. Yet Kings then suffered a mini collapse which took the pace out of their planned acceleration. First Pipe was caught at cover (121-3) then Perry was bowled without addition to his own score (121-4) and then Tighe went without troubling the scorers (121-5). Wright became Harris' third victim in the space of six balls as Kings lost a fourth quick wicket for the addition of 8 only runs (129-6). With just five overs left Mackenzie and Young then looked to push on as many runs as possible and Mackenzie struck some lusty blows picking up runs around the ground. Mackenzie fell in the penultimate over (155-7) and it was left to Young and Mears to see the innings total to 159.

Kings made a good start to the Honiton innings with both Tighe and Sones causing the batsmen problems and it was Sones who got the breakthrough bowling Stevens (4-1). Yet Kings suffered a blow when Paul Bygrave was injured fielding a hard hit drive which was to stop him from bowling. With West Indian Rampaul now at the crease the game started to swing away from Kings. Anything pitched up by the bowlers was superbly driven by Rampaul. However Kings had little luck as on three occasions Rampaul's aerial approach to his shots saw him just clear fielders.

Unfortunately when he did drive down to long on, Young running across from long off could not take the chance. Honiton had 50 on the board by the 9th over and Kings needed another breakthrough. It came when Lapping edged behind and Perry, still showing great form despite not having kept for a few years, took a great catch standing up to the stumps (64-2). However Rampaul was unstoppable and continued to drive magnificent sixes and soon went past his fifty. Even with men right back on the boundary Rampaul had no concerns about taking the bowlers on and all of them had maximums taken off their bowling. Pipe did figure out that by bowling just back of a length he was able to keep Rampaul quiet and he bowled a magnificent over during which the batsman was fortunate to survive.

Rampaul then survived another chance when he was dropped by Tighe at long off. But soon after, Kings did get a breakthrough when in attempting a second run Groves was run out by a super throw from the deep by Tighe which was quickly gathered and executed by Evans (100-3). Kings then had some fortune when Rampaul, in attempting to pull Evans, twisted something in his knee and after a prolonged delay retired injured having made a very impressive 73.

However with plenty of overs left Honiton were cruising and Soam was still quick to punish anything off line. Tighe returned to the attack and he picked up a wicket when Kelly chipped to Young at mid wicket (147-4) but some lusty blows from Dobie soon saw the home team to victory with five overs to spare.