The Sunday club eleven’s home campaign began on a belting day on Twickenham Green

as a combination of old hands and new blood met in the early afternoon sun to take on the

visiting South Londoners from Streatham and Marlborough. Unfortunately, the Ts cricket

was not as sparkling as the weather, with a below par performance allowing S&M to run

out convincing winners in a 40-overs-a-side game.

The day’s cricket started poorly with Ts skipper, Holger Kriess, losing the toss and his

S&M counterpart choosing to make first use of the usual decent batting strip on the

Green. The spirits of the TCC side were immediately lifted though as, first, the returning

Adam Crosby displayed the confectionery available to those taking catches and wickets

innings. Nice start.

There then came a period of consolidation from the Streatham boys with Knott and

Ashcar playing relatively watchfully and moving the score along at around three an over.

Amos and the ever-reliable Tony Bendelow bowled decent opening spells but could serve

up no more wickets. Thus, the skipper elected to make a double bowling change. Payne

took over from Amos at the Pavilion end and another debutant, Sean McDonald, replaced

Bendelow at the Green Spice end. It was McDonald who was among the wickets first,

bowling Knott for a well-made 26. Payne, mildly put out after having seen a regulation

slip chance go down off his second delivery, then grabbed a wicket courtesy of a fine

tumbling catch by Henderson at midwicket.

From here, the game began to drift away from the Ts. S&M’s number 4, Moss, began

moving the score along with some lusty pulls and cuts and the batting team’s run rate was

further inflated due to some poor Twickenham outfielding and the odd dropped catch.

The spin pairing of Chris Marshall (actor not drinker) and Dave Henderson entered the

fray and Marshall picked up a quick wicket, clean bowling Chamberlain. However, by

now the S&M batting had gained some momentum and runs were coming fairly freely.

Marshall had no further success and Henderson’s couple of wickets at the other end (one

courtesy of a decent stumping by Kriess and the other a catch at mid-on by Amos) did

little to stem the flow of runs. Twickenham then lost a player as McDonald, attempting to

take a sharp chance at short-midwicket, split his thumb. He returned after a trip to

Teddington Memorial Hospital and a couple of stitches, but was to take no further part in

the game.

Bendelow and Matt Huntington were asked to bowl the final few overs of the S&M

innings. Bendelow picked up a couple of wickets to round off a fine spell of bowling and

Huntington, with rage swelling due to some comical fielding in his first over, was then

soothed by taking two wickets with the final two balls of his second.

S&M finished their 40 overs with 190 runs, Moss having made a fine unbeaten halfcentury.

This was around 30 or 40 more than they should have been allowed to score and

looked a challenging target given the inexperienced Twickenham batting line-up.

Tea in the Pavilion was a delightful affair. The Hendometer was not called upon to give a

rating, but I suggest that a solid B+ would be appropriate.

The TCC reply to the S&M total had few highlights. Marshall and Tom Huntington

opened the innings but both were back in the Pavilion in pretty short order. Huntington

did not trouble the scorers, having been adjudged LBW in the second over, and Marshall

was clean bowled in the fifth over for 4. At 14 for 2, this brought Crosby and Amos

together in the middle for TCC’s only decent partnership. Crosby was his usual patient

self, tucking into anything full or wide from ball 1, while Amos was more circumspect at

the other end. If the Ts were to get anything out of the game, these two would need to

stay together. However, after 10 overs, the partnership came to an end as Crosby was

clean bowled by S&M’s left-arm spinner Dias for a decent 18. Wickets then fell at

regular intervals. Sheridan and Kriess both came and went without adding to the total and

Matt Huntington fared little better, scoring 4.

also bowled by Dias, for a fine 42. Dias went on to wrap things up, taking the wickets of

Payne (2) and Bendelow (0) to leave Henderson not out on 2. TCC were all out for 89 in

just over 26 overs.

All in all, this was a pretty poor effort from the Sunday 2s. While the bowlers performed

reasonably, the standard of fielding was low. This allowed S&M to set a total that would

always be challenging for a light-looking TCC batting line-up. However the capitulation

by the TCC batters wasn’t pretty to watch. The obvious bright spot from the game was

the performance of new-boy Stuart Amos with both bat and ball. A mention should also

to go to Sean McDonald who bowled a tidy spell before taking a debut trip to casualty.

Congratulations to Streatham and Marlborough for an excellent all round performance

and special mentions should go to Moss for his unbeaten 50 and Dias for a great spell of