Bracknell 30Apr06

Kings kicked off the 2006 season with an away victory over new opponents in Bracknell CC.
The match went ahead despite some early morning rain which made the pitch rather slow but true. Meanwhile the outfield which had only been cut for the first time since winter the week before the game was somewhat long making boundaries a rare commodity. Having won the toss Kings elected to bowl first.

Bracknell got off to a flying start as Heyes despatched the first two balls of Simon Pipe's opening over through point. However Pipe soon found his direction and with some appreciable movement had both opening batsmen playing and missing. Meanwhile Joel Miah was providing nothing for the batsmen to feed off in bowling three successive maidens. In what runs were being scored it was Heyes who was the dominant batsmen as Crittenden struggled to time the ball. This trend continued as Pipe and Miah continued to keep things tight. However when Miah was replaced by Bygrave Heyes launched into two straight drives to the long on boundary but this was only a temporary increase in the tempo as Bygrave soon found his length to regain control. However the early breakthrough Kings would have liked did not come until Pipe finally found the edge of Heyes' bat and Steve Smith took a smart catch behind the stumps. A second wicket soon came as a nervous looking Clarke, who had just been dropped, gave a second chance and Tighe made no mistake at silly mid-off to give Pipe his second wicket.

There should have been a third wicket when new batsmen Caffell edged a fine delivery from Tighe but this time Smith was unable to hold the catch. The scoring continued at a slow rate as Tighe and Bygrave continued to keep Crittenden and Caffell shackled with some fine bowling. With the clock starting to tick toward the time when a declaration would be required Kings knew an acceleration would soon be coming. Norman and Mears were then introduced to the attack in a change that was to turn the innings around. Mears had two good lbw shouts against Caffell turned down before the batsman slashed a wide delivery to Tighe at point. Norman then bowled skipper J.Bray before Mears took his second wicket when Crittenden drove uppish to Evans at extra cover. When Barlow over balanced Smith was quick to stump the batsman as the innings started to rapidly collapse. There was no better example of this when P.Bray was run out without facing a ball when trying for a second run off a miss field, Melligan gathering quickly and throwing to Norman who gathered well and broke the stumps. Mears then struck twice more, off the last ball of an over and the first of the next to give himself a chance of a hat trick and to make it five wickets. However it was not to be. The innings came an end when Norman claimed his third wicket, once again Smith completing the dismissal with a stumping.

Despite only chasing 106 to win, Kings knew the task would not be easy on the slow pitch. In the first three overs only a leg bye was scored, and then in the fourth over Richards bowled a wide ball that Miller cut but only to the hands of Heyes at backward point (1-1). Miah and Melligan then played watchfully as Caffell and Richards kept the pressure on. The batsmen seemed to be starting to get the better of the bowling until Caffell's extra height extracted extra bounce from the pitch and Miah was unlucky to splice a return catch to the bowler (12-2).

Evans then joined Melligan and they too seemed to be settling in well until Melligan made a misjudgement and left a ball from Caffell that cut back in to hit off stump (21-3). The introduction of spin from J.Bray eased some of the pressure, Norman despatching two balls in succession to the boundary. Caffell was then replaced by P.Bray, but there was no keeping the tall Caffell out of the game, just after dropping Norman off P.Bray he then made no mistake when Norman drove on the up to exactly the same player in the same position (42-4). Kings really had the odds stacked against them when Pipe fell in the very next over, when he pulled J.Bray to square leg, once again the tall Caffell took the catch (43-5). However Evans was still playing solidly and he now found the perfect foil in Tighe. By working the balls into the gaps and with some well struck boundaries they slowly edged the score past the half way mark and continued to grind out the runs to slowly reduce the runs required. The fifty partnership was posted by a well struck boundary by Tighe and even the reintroduction of Caffell and Crittenden joining the attack seemed unlikely to prevent Kings celebrating victory. However with just three runs needed Evans drove at Crittenden and was caught at backward point for a battling 33 (103-6). Then off the last ball of the same over Tighe was bowled for 39 to leave Kings at 104-7. Then off the first ball of the next over bowled by Caffell Mears was trapped on the crease as Kings lost their third wicket for just one run (104-8). Off the very next ball Bygrave got a thick inside edge which shot just past the leg stump allowing Bygrave and Young to complete the two runs needed for victory.

Despite the edgy closing moments this was a good battling performance from Kings, all the bowlers performed well, with Mears (4-8) and Norman (3-6) taking the plaudits. Whilst with the bat both Evans and Tighe adapted well to the conditions and the circumstances they found themselves in to battle through to take Kings within inches of the winning line.