Eleven of the Spirits faithful turned up bright and early at the Padang on Saturday for an 8.30am start against an SCC team who were already 1-0 up on us for the year. Dan Saunders as captain promptly lost the toss however it would not have mattered anyway as SCC opted to bat first allowing Dan his preferred option of fielding first whilst avoiding the howls of derision for the other Spirits members for actually opting to do so.
I was a beautiful day and we saw some beautiful cricket. The President/Vice-President combination opened the bowling with Glen Sedgeman (4/1/4/0) by far being the most economical of the bowlers and Amar Hanspal (6/0/27/0) bowling his six allotted overs on the trot to completely contain the SCC top three. Akash Mohan (6/1/29/1) was also very reliable with the ball and was unlucky only to take the one wicket. There must have been something in the Spirits bowler's water as even Rajesh (5/0/15/1) bowled well coming on for an over before drinks and continuing thereafter. After the first 15 overs we had managed to contain SCC to 50 odd however with wickets in hand SCC were still a threat.
After the break Dan (6/1/28/4) bought himself on to bowl and found some success, relieving SCC of four of their wickets in part due to some fantastic wicketkeeping by Chiro who took three stumpings in the match. Graham Gardiner (3/0/26/0) also brought some pace into the attack and bowled two very good overs followed by one not so good over, all of which however continuing to trouble the batsmen.
Good tight bowling and dedicated fielding from the whole team kept SCC to 133/6 off their 30 overs and Spirits came off the field feeling very confident in chasing down the total.
Bryan Deane (23) and Sarvana (15) opened for the Spirits with very contrasting styles. Saravana took the attack to SCC and found some success whilst Bryan made sure that SCC would have to work hard to get his wicket. After Saravana departed Graham (33) came in at no.3 and he and Bryan built a very useful partnership which took the Spirits all the way to drinks. The call from the captain at drinks was for the batsman to pick up the aggression and this approach fared well for two overs before both batsmen departed within the 18th over bringing Kalpesh Patel (21) and Paul Mclean (1) to the crease. Paul unfortunately departed early however Kalpesh was looking confident as Glen (23n.o.) joined him. It must be noted that Glen, thinking that it was unlikely that he would get out to the middle and despite having indulged in a few beers the night before, had just partaken of an hour long nets session directly before he went out to bat. To paraphrase his words it was 50/50 as to whether he would hit the ball or throw up on it. Despite his condition Glen managed to see out the innings with Rajesh (11n.o.) coming on for a late cameo hitting some lovely boundaries to take us over the line.
A comfortable win for the Spirts on the Padang and a lovely curry and beer at the Stumps bar afterwards. The series between Spirits and SCC now sits at one a piece.
Result
Spirits win by 5 wickets.
Man of the Match
Everyone performed very well with the captain narrowly missing out of a 5 wicket bag on the Padang however in the context of the game the MOM should be Glen Sedgeman for only going for 4 runs off his four overs and guiding Spirits through to the win with the bat in the later overs ensuring that the win was never at risk.
Wooden Spoon
Glen Segeman - He dropped an absolute sitter of my bowling though so I'll be waiting for the beer he owes me.
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