Castle Rising C.C. 3rd May 1998
By Tim Greenwood
The first match of the season after three wet weather cancellations. As cold as some of us have come to expect, this year saw the advent of a new and much welcomed tradition in the shape of mulled wine for the fielding side after an hour's freezing play. The match itself was played on a damp and somewhat uneven surface [some playing with the truth here Ed.] and was always going to be low scoring. Castle Rising elected to bat and made a hesitant 93 all out. Aside from frostbite, Hetairoi made it through a fielding session with only one injury, to the luckless Pablo who split open the top of his fourth finger in attempting and failing to take a sharp chance off the bowling of Brian [who else?]. Hetairoi then set about knocking off the total, worried only by the image of a Megone blast should we manage to lose the match. This we nearly did; an out of sorts Pablo holed out for 11, Clive Mackintosh managed to deflect the ball onto his stumps and the less said about Tim Greenwood's third bounce calamity the better. David Oliver rescued the side with a fighting 29, including an effortless strike which landed two inches from the boundary and bounced two inches over it. The inevitable middle order collapse was followed by a heroic stand involving Brian Slade and Jonathan Turnbull of 16 which swung the match finally in favour of Hetairoi. One match one win.
Champagne moment must be the aggressive maiden played out by Brian Slade with one run to win against an opponent on 7 for 14.
Man of the match for this correspondent must be the five wicket haul of Richard Andrews, despite two sixes being hit off him.
Congratulations to all....a win in our first outing....