The Magnificent Eight

Well what a result!

The Addiscombe U12's travelled to Beddington on Friday night for their penultimate league match. For various reasons they were under strength with only 8 players available but were determined to put on a good performance. Winning the toss and choosing to field first they performed very well despite there being a number of obvious gaps in the field. After the twenty overs Beddington had posted a score of 126 for the loss of only four wickets. Tom Kuhrt bowled particularly well with lots of variation and deserved more than the one wicket he snaffled.

Addiscombe then went into bat knowing that occupation of the crease was crucial to avoid the loss of early wickets. Unfortunately, we did lose one wicket early on. However, from this Nikhil Malhotra and Haseeb Ali came together and played superbly, risk free and maintained a good scoring rate. Nikhil achieved our first retirement of the season by achieving 30 runs and Haseeb was eventually out for an equally impressive 28. After ten overs the total was 90 and a flicker of belief was beginning to grow. This belief was knocked back very shortly afterwards by the umpire announcing that Addiscombe were to be fined 5 runs for running on the wicket! Thus the Beddington score was increased to 131 with a revised score of 132 required. Yet runs continued to flow albeit at a slower rate with the 6th wicket falling at the score on 121. Nikhil was then able to return to bat and with young Sam Wilson resolutely refusing to surrender his wicket, after 19 overs the score was at 130. The tension was almost too much to bear but with a wide off the first ball off the last over, suddenly Addiscombe had won the match!

A fantastic achievement considering we were without 3 players, certainly the highlight of the season so far!