Smiler's Big Day

By BH - October 1 2015
Smiler's Big Day
unbeaten Baston travelled the short distance to Spalding, read how they get on here>>

Adam lost the toss and Baston were asked to bat. Following his remarkable century the week before, Liam was padded up and on his way to the crease with the returning VSM. For no reason or logic, Adam decided that he was going to let Joe open with Mark, and demoting the free-scoring Liam down to 4. This may have been something to do with Joe missing out on a bat last week, and begging Adam in the car to let him open. Fortunately Liam is a reasonable fellow and was more than happy to drop the down the order, as he wished the mini-openers luck as they made their way out to the middle.

 

Proving the skipper wrong that it was a bowling day, Mark and Joe set about the youthful Spalding attack, scoring runs freely and without much incident. Joe (28) was the first to depart, as he had his off stump knocked back by Spalding girl Gardner. He took it well though and only threw 6 of his batting items in the air on his long return to the pavilion. Lamin took up the mantle and ably assisted Mark in another big partnership.

15 Spalding VSM1VSM in great touch

 

Mark was really flying as he reached his 50, hitting the ball to all areas as Spalding didn't know where to bowl at him. The score had passed 150 when Lamin was given out LBW to some joke spinner.

15 Spalding LaminWe're Lamin...

 

Liam was next to the crease in his new dynamic number four role, and lasted just 2 balls before getting even more fed up and picked out a fielder on the square leg boundary. As Liam returned, Adam went and hid in the toilets.

Mark was into the nineties as Ben joined him at the crease. After getting himself in, Ben started playing more aggressively and more importantly managed to rotate the strike, and with 5 overs left, Mark took a single to long off which brought up his maiden century, a stunning effort by the pint sized farmer.

15 Spalding VSM3Mark speeds along to his maiden century

 

Ben departed shortly after for 29, and Mark was finally out for 118 off the penultimate ball of the innings. Baston finished on 230-6.

15 Spalding VSM2

 

Everyone was confident at tea, as Mark had to be calmed down as his posh laughter had disturbed some local houses. Lloyd had heard the news of Mark's ton and had turned up in his stolen Zephyr.

Adam stuck with his opening partner from the week before at Boston, as Hawk shared the new ball (Liam was even more upset) Both bowlers picked up a brace of early wickets, Adam as usual bowling tidy lines outside off stump and drawing the mistake from the batsman, while Hawk bowled a variety of stuff which had the same effect.

Meanwhile there was a bit of ill-feeling between the 2 sulkers in the team, as Liam told Joe BBAG off for not shining the ball up. As he was still scared, Adam sided with Liam and threatened to banish Joe BBAG down to fine-leg.

Due to his age, Hawk is only allowed to bowl 6 overs per spell in SLBL cricket, and after his 3 overs contained a Hamesonian 43 deliveries, he was removed from the attack. (3-0-31-2)

With the weather looking a bit dicey, it looked to be a good time to get Tim and Lamin's slow attack on to buy wickets from the inexperienced Spalding order. Adam did what he thought was safest, and tossed the ball to Liam.

Resilience from senior bat Andrews (27) frustrated Baston, but Liam (4-24) and the skipper (4-19) saw the boys home before drinks, and not long before the rain came down.

Most of the post-game talk was about Mark's brilliant century, although the (very small) man himself was in a rush and had to shoot off to some farmer's ball soon after.

 

15 Spalding Team

scorecard: http://baston.play-cricket.com/website/results/2374214