ACC tie with Beddington in rain-affected thriller

Match report by Peter Murphy

After losing the toss the Beddington captain opted to bowl first. The conditions for batting were good, with a dry and freshly rolled wicket. However, not long after the first delivery it started to rain. Jon and Johnathan opened the batting a put on a fine display of classy cricket shots. With Johnathan scoring a fluent 28 runs.

After seeing off the opening bowlers, 2 wickets fell in relatively quick succession and a new partnership was formed between Aaron and Krishna. From the get go it was clear that they meant business, responsibly defending their wicket and scoring off the loose balls. Not being known as a big hitter, it was a surprise for everyone when Aaron flicked a full toss for six! The weather continued to worsen and we were batting in the rain at this point. With our overs coming to a close our batsmen began to speed up. Aaron got run out for 36, and Krishna got caught on 28.

Yash came in to bat with only a few overs to go. He showed the opposition how to hit a 6, with a beautiful straight drive over the side screen, scoring a quick 27. The Adders finished the innings with 174 for 7.

With a defendable total we were optimistic entering the field. With the rain finally taking a break, our opening bowlers got to work. Jarred bowled a tight line and length keeping the run rate low in his overs. Unfortunately, rain had caused the wicket to be very slow off the bounce, helping the Beddington openers to score some early runs quickly.

Seeing that the wicket wasn’t ideal for seam up bowlers Jon brought on Peter. Taking a wicket in his first over, when the batsman edged a ball that Jon caught. He went on to bowl two consecutive maidens and going for only 17 runs in his 7 overs.

At this point the weather turned and the sky’s opened up. Pausing for 35 minutes meant an adapted target was calculated with Beddington needing 72 runs in 19 overs with 9 wickets left.

It was at this point when Jon brought himself and Nikhil on to bowl. It was going to be a challenge to keep the run rate low enough to win the game, but Jon and Nikhil delivered some of the best overs I’ve seen for a while at Addiscombe.

Jon skittled through 4 of the Beddington batsmen maintaining a tremendous economy at the same time. Nikhil turned the ball both ways completely bamboozling the batsmen and taking 3 wickets. In conjunction with a tremendous fielding effort (Max taking two difficult catches), it came down to the last over with 4 runs needed by the opposition to win.

Nikhil stepped up, and delivered his best over yet. Nikhil dismissed their skipper and with 3 balls to come Beddington needed just one run to win. Two dots followed before Nikhil delivered the final ball of the match, a peach of a ball which the batsmen missed completely. Aaron quickly stumped out the batsmen as they tried to run the last ball, finishing the match on a tie.

Overall, there was a great performance put in by the entire Addiscombe team. Displaying some fantastic batting, bowling and fielding. If this game is anything to go by the 3s are in for a good season!