8/9/2007- Chearsley Away

With the League title settled the previous week we travelled to bottom placed Chearsley with the opportunity to set a new Cherwell League record. It is thought that no team had gone through a season by winning every game that they completed. Another incentive was that we went into the last round of matches in joint first place for the Oxford Mail Club of the Year Trophy. This is decided on the aggregate points total of the first and second teams.
Chearley, fielding a young team and playing only for pride, won the toss and decided to bat. They could not have made a worse start as Leighton James, charging up the hill, pinned Wilcox in front of his stumps in the first over. More trouble soon followed as Veness was beaten for pace and both openers were back in the pavillion with only fourteen on the board.
This bought Babington to the wicket to join his skipper, Neil Davies. He quickly anounced his intentions by taking two fours off the remainder of Leightons over. Surviving chances to the wicket keeper and slips the runs flowed and the 50 was on the board in the 11th over. The skipper was keeping a lid on the scoring rate by using the slope effectively but a flurry of boundaries at the other end made a change inevitable.
Mark Strong replaced the skipper and Matt Scrivener, Leighton. Ten runs from Matts first over saw heads start to drop in the field. The pair brought up the hundred in the 21st over and the hundred partnership four overs later. However, with Matt finding a good line and Mark taking the pace off the ball there was a perceptive change of tempo. Babington was now dealing in singles, not in boundaries and Davies was failing to pierce the field. Babington finally lost patience and lofted Strong into the mid wicket area and Pablo, running in from the boundary, held a good catch. Davies, soon followed when he failed to clear Chis day at deep mid on and the course of the innings had changed. A seventh wicket stand between the teenagers Hignall and Holland of 36, was the only threat to our growing confidence and the innings subsided, as Mark and the returning Leighton polished off the middle and late order. It was finally ended on 183 in the 49th over, as Mark bowled Baker for his fifth wicket. With Leighton taking four, it is obvious the impact that these two fine cricketers have had on our season.
Tom and Steve took guard knowing that with an inexperienced middle order, a good start was needed. All looked well as Tom took three boundares off the erratic Holland. However, he soon edged the same bowler to first slip and we were one down. Pablo joined Steve and runs were quietly accumulated until, Pablo was comprehensively bowled by Holland for three in the 11th over. Worse was to follow, as Mark Strong saw his leg glance from Davies taken one handed by a diving keeper with only 44 on the board.
Chris Day strode to the wicket with a job to do. Having been kept in cotton wool for most of the season by the success of the upper order, it was his chance to make his mark. After, a brief period of orientation both he and Steve unleashed a volley of shots. In barely 10 overs 83 were added, with Chris at one point crashing five successive balls to the boundary. Steve reached his 50 by pulling leg spinner Hignall for six. However, this was a brief respite from the torment he was suffering from the beguiling skills of the 14 year old. Despite his claims of his previous success against wrist spinners in his garden in South Australia, he was mesmerised by the drift obtained by the teenager. Having survived two stumping chances, he finally ran out of luck when he scooped a top spinner to mid on.
Chris Day then reached his own 50 when he drove Babington down the ground for four before being bowled in the same over. This left us still 45 runs short with little recognised batting to come. When Ed Pettit- Mills was sixth out soon after, it seemed that unbeaten record might be elusive. However, Leighton James was keen to demonstrate that there was more to his batting than we had previously had the chance to see. Clearly better able than Stevo to read Hignall, he got off the Mark with a straight drive for six. With the unflappable John Guthrie looking secure at the other end, Leighton distainfully dispatched the bad ball to all parts before failing to clear the deep fielders with 3 required, his score on 28. This left 4th team captain Malcolm West the opportunity to round off the season memorably. Alas, as Babington served up a wide half volley with hit me all over it, Davies plucked the resulting edge out of the evening sky. Malcolm walked disconsolately back to the pavillion, wondering whether another weekends camping might not have been the better option.
Puffing out his ample chest, captain Stanners strode to the crease. Took guard, looked around the field once, then punched his first ball to the boundary. They could not have written the script, the captain famously clinching victory number 14, marching off the field to the rapturous applause of his team. What a season!
As a postscript we learned that with Nondies seconds winning and Long Marsdons 1st and seconds also winning that we are joint Club of the season.