Cricketweb Blue vs Cricketweb Black
@ PDV Dome
Scorecard
Ball by Ball
Cricketweb Blue went with an unchanged line up for their home clash with Black, the two pre season favourites have had a bit of a mixed bag to start the season and the winner of this match would get themselves into a strong position to challenge for the all important top two spot.
Dan Smith won the toss and chose to bat on an overcast day, the pitch was flat and the outfield was in good order, so other than a small ammount of swing being generated by Blue's medium pacers there weren't too many demons to worry about for Black. It was an excellent start by the visitors as the middle order sat around and watched their openers chip away towards a good total, as we have come to expect from James Stedman and Ash Chaulk, once they get in they are hard to remove. Both posted impressive centuries with Chaulk batting through the innings for 114 not out, Stedman had a good majority of the strike and was out early in the batting powerplay in the 47th over for 124. Dan Smith who had sat with the pads on for the best part of three hours was out first ball and Josh Ritchie barely had time to scratch himself during his 8 not out. Liam Camps took both wickets for Blue as Black finished with the respectable score of 274/2.
While it was a strong performance from Black, Blue knew that if their top order fired then this was a gettable score. However the early dismissals for Liam Camps and Sean Fuller put Black in the drivers seat as most of the middle order went the way of their experienced openers, a couple of poor run outs didn't help their cause with Michael Cannon and Jake Luffman both being left high and dry by their partners, Alex Crampton and Rob Bowen got together with the score at 67/5 and posted a 126 run partnership in good time to get Blue back in the game but the depature of the pair slowed down the scoring and they weren't able to recover, at the end of their 50 overs Blue were 252/9, vice-captain Nath Patrick took 3 wickets as all the bowlers looked in good form.
Cricketweb Black 274/2 (50)
JE Stedman 124(152), AP Chaulk 114*(136), LA Camps 2/53
Cricketweb Blue 252/9 (50)
AJ Crampton 70(93), RF Bowen 66(78), NL Patrick 3/52
Cricketweb Black won by 22 runs
Man of the Match: AP Chaulk (CW Black)
Crickweb Green vs Cricketweb Colts
@ CWBCC Stadium
Scorecard
Ball by Ball
The top two teams on the table took on each other in a mouthwatering clash at the CWBCC Stadium in round 6. The overachieving Colts are yet to lose a match in this form of the game this season while Green have probably looked the most impressive with the bat especially since the return of wicketkeeper Ben Read.
Chris Butler won the toss for Colts and chose to bat first, conditions were tough early on and the steady Dan Rai was a good man to have at the crease to help build the innings, he battled hard while Yngve Fjermestad played his natural game before being stumped of the bowling of former Colts spinner Jack McNamara for 27, Dan Towns joined Rai at the crease and the pair couldn't keep the scoreboard ticking over, despite having wickets in hand it was a struggle for the two to even get the run rate above three an over at times. Rai was eventually out for 53 and Towns for 45 and the pressure was heaped on the lower order when Bosco Fitzsimmons came in and also struggled to get the ball off the square. Perhaps not enough credit was given to the Green's bowlers at the time but it was easy to be critical of the Colts batting so slowly on what appeared to be a good deck, no one in the lower order could strike at over 75 and this resulted in a final total of 198/5 from the 50 overs, well below what was likely to be needed to be a winning score. Manju Reddlappali made his first real contribution of the season with an impressive 8 over spell of 3/19 while Jack McNamara bowled far better than his 2/40 off 10 suggests.
Green came out to bat eyeing off the possiblity of a couple of bonus points, knowing they'd need to knock off the runs in under 25 overs Nick Scott and Andrew Garven didn't hold back right from the start, both struck at nearly 100 before throwing away good starts before Ben Read came in and belted his way to an impressive 48 from 54 balls. Colts bowlers did a good enough job in halting Green's charge to the two bonus points but with Martyn Corrin teeing off there was little they could do to avoid a big drubbing, Rob Cribb joined Corrin to hit the winning runs as Colts total was surpassed in the 33rd over, despite eventually giving up a bonus point it was a good effort from the bowlers who will no doubt be asking questions of their batsmen later on. Mike Wilson was the pick of the bowlers for Colts despite taking just the one wicket.
Cricketweb Colts 198/5 (50)
DK Rai 53(92), DP Towns 45(81), M Reddlappali 3/19, JP McNamara 2/40
Cricketweb Green 199/3 (32.1)
M Corrin 73*(57), BS Read 48(54), MW Wilson 1/22
Cricketweb Green won by 7 wickets with 107 balls to spare
Man of the Match: JP McNamara (CW Green)