A Great Start to the Merrow Cricket Season 2018

Anyone venturing down to the ground last Friday would have witnessed a fantastic start to the 2018 cricket season. The outfield looked immaculate, the sun had been shining all day and the bar was open!

The Merrow U15s had a cup game to play and on winning the toss our captain Jim Woodriffe invited Woking & Horsell to bat. A characteristically hostile opening spell from Tom Sandison set the tone for the innings and in the third over Ben Barnes took a stunning one-handed catch above his head at mid-wicket. With strong support from Michael Gallagher, James Munt and George Negus and with a relatively slow outfield, Woking worked their way to 33 for three at the halfway mark. Consistently good bowling and fielding made it hard for the batsmen to score freely and by the end of the twenty overs they had posted 71 for eight wickets. George taking three wickets, Tom and James two apiece and a terrific run out during one of debutant James Freed's overs.

With the run-rate set at a modest three and a bit per over it became apparent pretty quickly that unless there was a dramatic collapse, 71 wasn't going to be enough. So it proved, with Jim scoring a classy 38 and Rohan Bali carrying his bat for a solid 16 not out. A lapse in concentration from Jim resulted in his wicket falling and Ben Barnes after scoring a six, was unlucky to be adjudged LBW after what sounded like a pretty thick inside edge before the ball hit his pad. Fortunately the result was unaffected and Merrow cruised to victory in the 14th over.

Many thanks to all of you who came along to help get the ground ready in time for a prompt start - and a huge 'well done' to the eleven boys who put in such a solid performance. Of course there are things to work on - there always is - but as starts go, this was a very good one. It was fantastic to hear the levels of encouragement and positivity in the field and the support offered to each other - keep it up lads.