2nd XI’s 4th consecutive win keeps push for promotion on track, and Bez stays ’til the end.
With Brian doing his usual sleight of hand with the coin-toss, he put Stalybridge into bat to try and maximise points, being a point behind Mottram CC at the start of the day, who don’t play today due to the odd number of teams in the league, despite a slow start, with only 26 runs on the board after 15 overs, albeit down a decent performance from both openers, it was the introduction of James Beswick at #4 that made the difference to the innings, managing to survive 27 overs to finish the innings 64 not out, the main other notable performance of the innings was from Extras, who managed 30, due to a large number of wide deliveries from the Offerton bowlers, with the full 45 overs complete, Stalybridge had put 183 on the board, for 6 wickets, with Offerton openers Karl Martin and Imran Solail, managing 2-40 and 0-23 respectively for their full 12 overs each.
Just four balls into the Offerton innings, James Beswick dismissed opening batsman Karl Martin for 0 and his opposite counterpart Jim Senior only survived 10 deliveries before suffering a massive back spasm, which saw him caught behind by keeper Joe Robinson, however 30 minutes later an ambulance had to be called for Jim, due to his being in such pain and unable to move, everyone in the the 2nds hope he’s ok, and wishes him a speedy recovery.
With nine straight maidens from Beswick and Pete Coxon, it took until the 10th over before bat touched ball to generate runs, the next 4 wickets fell to Pete Coxon in quick succession and a protracted batting performance from #3 Imran Solail was kept to just 13 runs from 80 balls, before being dismissed by Gary Sandiford, but it was his final strike partner Tony Davies who contributed most to Offertons innings with 37 before being caught at slip by Alex Wilde, the visiting side then doggedly frustrated the Stalybridge bowlers hanging on for the remaining overs to finish the match 107 for 9 denying the home side maximum bowling points.
The result sees Stalybridge move up into second place in the league table, at least until next week, which sees them head back into deepest, darkest Derbyshire to take on Chapel-en-le-Frith.
I was hoping to have had the electronic scoreboard in place for the 2nd to last home game for the 2nds, but delays with the metal-work meant it will only get one game this season, before being put into storage.
Result: Stalybridge St. Paul’s 2nd XI win by 76 runs.
Match scorecard: Stalybridge St Pauls CC 2nd XI-Offerton 2nd XI