HSMCC v South Nutfield

Report by Mike MacDonagh

As starts to the season go, the game against South Nutfield was predictable in some ways but not in others. As expected, it was cold with a biting Northerly wind, Holmbury batted first and we beat the visitors relatively easily. less expected was that we didn't win the toss and the victory wasn't as convincing as it might have been.

Batting first Dan Russell and Nigel Menzies (15) saw us to 49 before Nigel was out in the 10th over. Getting a solid start at a decent rate is vital in 40-over cricket and our first choice openers did the business again. Jonny Russell (11), helped push the score and Raoul Colvile (25) helped push the score along and, after Dan was out for an excellent 68, Mat Evans (14) did the same, so that, in the 27th over we were 169 for 5 with Bradley Cooper and Phil King at the crease. These two proceeded to put on 96 for the sixth wicket in just 11 overs before Bradley was out for an excellent 72, Phil remaining unbeaten on 44 as we ended our innings on 289-6.

Needing to score at a little more than 7 an over, South Nutfield never really embraced the challenge, one of their openers carried his bat but only made 68 in 40 overs. This was helped by an aggressive and accurate opening spell from new man Harrison Webb, who bowled 8 overs for just 14 runs and would have put pressure on the South Nutfield batsmen had they been interested in anything more than just obtaining maximum batting points. We might have wrapped things up earlier and achieved maximum points had a few catches not gone down but the freezing weather provides some excuse there. As it was, the other new boy (at least for Saturday), Jonny Russell showed the way with two good grabs as we ended up taking 6 wickets as the visitors ended on 205 from their 40 overs and he and Harrison showed us how fielding should be done. Dave Hadaway (7 overs 2-28) and Mat Evans (8 overs 2-47) took a couple of wickets each and Monu Sharma (8 overs 1-31) and Charles Colvile (5 overs 1-39) the others. All in all a good performance and exactly the start we needed to life in Div 2. I suspect tougher challenges lie ahead.