Saints A vs DHS St Pierre
17/10/2010 @ home ground (Port Soif)
Result: Saint Saviours beat St Pierre easily.

by “Mike” Thornton, aka DJ

At an eerily listless Port Soif, which now feels like Saints’ home ground, the Saints boys turned out after a week off, still feeling the pain from their narrow defeat to Rovers. Things weren’t looking too clever from the off, with an already weakened side suffering from last minute dropouts, suggesting that Saints were on for a struggle. But there’s one thing you can’t fault about Saint Saviours Cricket Club – the strong and determined spirit that runs throughout the whole club – and the gaps in the side were plugged purposefully by Alex Streeting, Ishwar and a debut for mini-TV Tom Veillard.

In a tactical change of direction, skipper Scrappy let vice-skipper Brocky handle the toss. Playing right in to our hands, they called correctly and asked Saints to bat. RV and DJ1 opened up. DJ was quickly suffering from the strong sunshine and unusual lack of howling wind (weather-wise), and failing to find the boundary, which meant a lot of running. Fortunately, RV was unphased at the other end and was soon picking off a rather lacklustre St Pierre bowling attack. 6 overs in and the score had raced to 60 with the only threat to the run-scoring being DJ keeling over. RV soon passed 50 and with the score on 80 odd, DJ finally found the middle of the bat, only to see it scream directly in to acrobatic hands of wide extra cover, departing for 24 and a bit of a lie-down in the shade. This brought Kneller to the crease who, in judging the complete lack of threat from the bowling, elected to don the floppy wide-brim instead of a helmet. A good call, and the free flow of runs continued.

After a near faultless innings, RV was soon in to the 90s. We’re not sure if there’d been some unusual betting behaviour going on before and/or during the match, as RV seem determined not to get to 3 figures, whereas the oppo seemed determined to get him there. He was dutifully dropped on 94, then again on 95 and should have been run out on 98. One more took him to 99 and the century seemed assured. Not to be, unfortunately – RV had intentions to do it style and tried to put the ball in the middle of Port Soif bay at high tide… only to see it spoon to mid-wicket, and this time it was collected. Shame not to get the hundred, but no doubt he’d done the job and set Saints up for what looked like an imposing total, out for 99 off just 59 balls.

Kneller continued with Goodie in fine fettle for the remaining 3 overs. Aiming for 180, they were both hitting it sweetly until the brim of the floppy dropped in front of Kneller’s eyes – the momentary blindness saw him sky an easy one to the keeper with 2 balls left, departing for an all-run 37. Goodie managed 6 from the final 2 for a useful 19* – Saints ending on 182 for 3.

It was always going to be a tough job for the oppo – and it’s never made any easier when you’ve got Phil Dodd hurtling in at the top end like a man possessed. He wasted no time and produced the best Div 1 opening over of the season – [..W.W.] – for a double wicket maiden, score 0-2 from 1. The foolhardy opening batsman spied Broquette Cider floundering about at mid off, but failed to get the ball over the big man as he launched in to the air, pouching a sharp catch mid-air Collingwood-style, before clattering to the ground, bag-of-potatoes-style. Dodd’s second was a skier, ably snaffled by keeper Goodie. Scrappy had long since made his excuses about testing his dodgy hamstring, but nevertheless opened up from the other end. A bit of extra bounce saw his second ball whistle away for 4 byes, still no runs off the bat, and the batsmen looking pretty confused by it all.

They somehow managed to assemble something of a partnership and were 52 for 2 before it all fell apart and the wickets started to tumble. A second dropped catch off his bowling saw Scrappy’s hamstring mysteriously start playing up, and unfortunately at his age doesn’t have the miraculous healing powers that some of the younger Saints have, not to mention the small gaggle of supporters in the clubhouse getting the beers in, saw Scrapyard limp off the field. It turned out to be some tactical brilliance, however, as Ishwar took over with the ball, and quickly made the breakthrough beating the batsmen, letting Sir Goodie in for a stumping. To cap that, in to the next over and a suicidal run let Scrappy’s sub, young Olly Tapp, who will be in trouble at home for playing in and getting grass stains on his school trousers, get on the scorecard with a run out. Deputy Dave “DJ2″ Jones was in to the action at the other end, and accounted for the last remaining semblance of a batting line up with another catch for Jonty Brockingwood and a brilliantly judged skier for Alex Streeting who, in making a much harder catch look very easy, might have been wondering what the fuss with catching a cricket ball was really all about.

Sensing an opportunity for a few easy wickets, Kneller was in to the action and quickly finished off the tail. Not before Brockback had turned his arm over for an over, though, and was probably grateful that it only had to be the one. At 10 down, the oppo had had enough and threw in the towel – all out for 106 from 17.5 overs – Saints getting the victory by an impressive 76 runs.

A sterling all-round team performance – solid batting performance, followed up by accurate bowling and all backed up in the field with some quality fielding – special mention to Tom Veillard, Alex Streeting and Ishy who made themselves available to us and looked well at home in the A side. With performances like that, there’s no question that we should be top of the table at the end of the season.

-DJ

Scorecard: Scorecard Saints A vs St Pierre (23) – thanks Sue!