After everyone eventually found the cricket ground, we won the toss on a good looking wicket and decided to have a bat. A straight swap at the top of the order with last week’s centurion Jamie Keeler being replaced by fellow left hander Joseph Libby. The left handedness is where the batting similarities ended. With a strong breeze, a massive in-swinging seed at a horrid length combined with a nasty glare off a car windscreen (according to Joey) the usually self assured batsmen was sent back to the pavilion first ball after leaving a straight one.
@Tom Carr (4) soon followed Joey to the hut with a thick edge to gully after trying a few times to play the exact same shot. Saltwood 4 for 2 wickets, the pressure was on.
A well hydrated Ryan Hall (45), Dan Cowell (22), Joey Pratt (23) and Jack (12) added to the scoreboard throughout the middle overs, but it was really well constructed innings from the evergreen Jeremy Russell (53) which put Saltwood in the driving seat. A late cameo from Brick hands Brice Dempster (15), Harry Stafford (6) and Teddy Easthope (8*) saw Saltwood post a competitive 205 from 40 overs.
After a lovely tea, as you’d expect from Sandwich, our opening bowlers started their work. Their opening bat proved hard to budge so the Saltwood bowlers attacked the other batsmen, with most of their middle order getting starts but not sticking around for too long. The 205 target looked like a possibility for Sandwich, but Harry S made the all important break through, bowling their opening bat for 65. Joey Pratt came back on at the end to pick up 3 well deserved wickets, and Brice Dempster bowled a very tight spell of 10 overs for just 27 runs, it was good to see him back in form. Sandwich finished their innings on 177-9
Saturday’s Hide Physiotherapy Man of the Match is Jeremy Russell, for his superb 53 run innings, full of back foot cut shots (before June as well)
Hide Physiotherapy (www.hidephysiotherapy.co.uk) have been successfully treating private patients for over 10 years and provide high quality physiotherapy to our clients at their practice in Hythe.
