The vine were welcomed to Chestfield in Whitstable where the chance of any play was doubtful. This is where captain courageous, Gus stepped in with his diplomatic skills and convinced the oppo to play a 30-over fixture.
The vine were sent in to bat on a rather two-paced wicket but we got off to a great start with 15 coming off the first over, coutesy of 3 Hugh Piper boundaries. Bowden carried on in his attacking fashion before he was unluckily stumped on a ball that went underground (22). Piper kept ticking along before he found deep squares throat for a well made 23.
This allowed Harry Bevan-Thomas, the destroyer of worlds and Krish Joshi to plink it about for a little. After some quick singles and doubles Joshi was dismissed on 12. This brought Finn Kirkland out to bat with around 10 overs to go. He and BT lifted the run rate and after 22 overs the vine were on 100. After a few overs of plinking and good running between the wickets, Kirkland was dismissed being caught at short mid-wicket (16). James White’s week-long hiatus from cricket came to a close as he came back into the side on saturday. He joined BT out in the middle and also the bomb squad for the day. James (19) batted very well until BT ran him out trying to run four to bring up his half-century.
El capitan Angus (10*) and Bevan-Thomas (67*) each hit a maximum to close out the innings, allowing the vine to post a competitive total of 179 from their 30 overs.
Now it was the bowlers’ turn. With just his 3rd ball Harry Robinson cleaned up the Chestfield opening batsman with one that jagged in. After this, the number 3 and opener had a nice partnership and some doubt started settling in. Welcome Sam Jones. Sam’s flight deceived their opening batsman and he was stumped just shy of 30. Not long after this Krish Joshi trapped the number 3 batter in front of middle on 57 with the first ball of his spell. Spirits were high after this but the Vine knew that it wasn’t going to be easy. Any complacency and the game slips away.
The Chestfield batsmen starting forming partnerships in the middle which took the game away from the Vine a little bit until Joshi took 2 more quick fire wickets in partnership with brilliant bowling from Bevan-Thomas, and great fielding from Matt Dawkins who got a crutial run out with a rolled ankle.
Chestfield required 23 off 18 balls and the final over came down to 11.
Welcome to the man-of-the-day, Harry Bevan-Thomas. Ice-cool, pressure-soaker, Harry Bevan-Thomas brings it home. Only 7 scored from the over and great vibes back to the Winyard.
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