Hayes 3’s – Weather & Naughty Star in Last 2 Weeks

June 7th – Weather the winner as both teams denied an exciting climax.

With rain looming, Matt Warne standing in for Colin Couldrey, who courageously battled through his gout to umpire for the 3s, negotiated a 30 over a side competition and then won the toss electing to field on a deck that looked like it would do a bit for the bowlers. Baker, L and Hadley took the new ball for Hayes and for a while the OD CUACO openers looked comfortable particularly captain Chris Colby. Then, Hadley produced some moments of magic, he dismissed Nair with one that flew to gully, smartly taken by Thistleton, before knocking over Thomas Lake with an unplayable ‘Jaffa’ which swung away and moved off the pitch through the gate bowling him for 0.

The next dismissal will be one Gul will want to forget, Colby played a lovely shot through the covers, given the slow outfield it was a surprise to almost everyone when Gul confidently announced ‘that’s gone’ multiple times, imagine his surprised when Colby called him through for what should have been a comfortable 2 save for the rocket arm of Ronnie Buddin which dismissed Gul at the non-strikers end. Hadley picked up another and Davis bowled another miserly spell, unlucky to only get the one wicket. Johnny Wilkie accounted for OD’s dangerman Colby for 40 and at one point it looked like 100 would be out of reach. Billy Rouse and Louis Boyden put on a good partnership with a mix of aggressive batting and good footwork. Boyden falling to Buddin with the keeper taking a steepler diving forward, have just come up to the stumps to negate some of the footwork. But with ODs scoring 125-8 off their 30 Hayes were confident they could knock the total off, if the rain stayed away.

Hayes early confident seemed to wane a little, when skipper Warne snicked off to the very tidy bowling of Asa Smith. Jesse Rowson, promoted from the 4s looked promising, playing some nice shots before being bowled by Rouse trying to hit one back over the bowlers to the 2^nd XI playing at Catford Wanderers. Thistleton, who has been on a good run off form recently, also looked good hitting a couple of early boundaries, but in an effort to spare Gul’s blushes and ensure OD’s didn’t have the monopoly on poor running, was run out at the strikers end after not hearing a call of wait from Pulkit. Hayes’ inning was stuttering, and OD were beginning to get on top. ‘Big Time’ Alex Stirling making his 3s debut looked to add some spark back into the Hayes batting but was dismissed in what was almost a carbon copy of Rowson’s dismissal.

Verma was joined at the crease by Millard and the pair watchfully navigated the Hayes innings to drinks as the rain started to encroach. Rouse took the first over after drinks and will be rueing the fact the game lasted one more over. The ball had become very wet and Millard took three 4s off the over, which went for 15 in total before umpire Colin and the OD’s captain agreed that the wet ball and outfield was no longer creating a fair balance between bat and ball. Sadly for all, the rain got heavier and heavier and the teams shook hands. With the points being shared equally, although both sides will have thought they had a good chance of winning the game.

No ‘Pressos’ due to the Summer party, but we must have a player of the match and for his 3-22 Will ‘Wiggy’ Hadley deserves it, at times over the years he has been incredibly unlucky not to pick up more wickets but on this day he got his deserved rewards for a good spell of swing bowling. Next week, the 3s host Old Colfeians on the back square at Hayes, in a clash of two of the teams who were promoted last season. With Hayes looking to build on their early success of the season, being the first team in Div 9 to break 100 points for the season.

Notable performances:

H(K)CC:

1. Hadley 7-2-22-3

ODCCC:

1. Colby 40

June 14th – Davis puts Colfs on the ‘Naughty’ Step as 3s go on!

Skipper Couldrey was still suffering from gout, so he provided a fantastic tea for the week. Stand in captain Warne went out to toss, always resplendent, despite a lack of blazer. Having declared he was 60/40 wanting to bowl if he won, Warnie won the toss and elected to bat.

Jesse and Warne opened and looked to make a positive start and built a solid opening partnership before Jesse fell to the bowling of Jagger, who based on his chat in the field may be a regular reader of these reports. Jesse finished the innings as joint top scorer with 30 (41). Wickets much like London bus seemed to come in twos and Matt Warne fell the next over rueing his decision to chase a wide one and snicking off. Hayes were 67-2 but felt confident in building on their good start.

Returning Jamie Askew, kept looking to get a big sweep away but just couldn’t manage it and he got to 16 before feathering one off Jagger to Colfs’ keeper Chris Tarrant, sweeping. When Buddin fell with the score at 111 and Pulkit at 120 having scored a good 25 there was a risk of Hayes losing the impetus of their good start and Colfs very much felt like they were on top. Millard and Wilkie were hoping to recreate their partnership from the 1^st game of the season. But just as Wilkie was looking to kick on, he snicked off, bring Luca Baker to the crease. With Millard and Baker, intensity of running was the order of the day with both looking to score singles and twos on a: deck, outfield and bowling attack that was making boundaries hard to come by. Both batters were given lives, but they kicked the score on and put the pressure back on the fielding side. Their 53-run partnership coming to an end when Millard tried to force things in the 3^rd from last over being bowled with Hayes 184-7.

Luca Baker departed with one ball left in the innings and Will Hadley secured a 200 strike rate to leave the 3s on 197 off their 40 overs which felt around par with the outfield being a bit slower after Friday nights rain.

Baker and Hadley took the new ball and were using it to great effect, Baker bowling huge inswing which was enough to account for the Colfs opener Nagappan for 4 lbw. Hadley at the other end varied his pace well and a slower ball from him proved to be the final answer for Chris Tarrant as he chipped it into the grateful hands of a returning MD Belal. A string of close lbw appeals was concluded with a fairly straight forward decision for umpire P. Askew as Hadley had the dangerous looking Conneely out for 12. Betwixt the Hadley wickets Baker had produced the ball of the day to bowl Christopher Thomas through the gate with the ball clipping the outside half of leg stump. Baker was unlucky not to pick up a 3^rd in his spell but at 34-4 Hayes were very much on top.

MD Belal and ‘Naughty’ Tom Davis assumed their usual positions as change bowlers. Davis bowled his usual nagging line and length and Belal looked to fizz the ball through full and probing at the batters’ pads and edge. Davis was the first of the pair to strike getting past the stoic defences of Richard Burton who was dismissed for 1. Davis struck again shortly after and Colfs slipped to 67-6 their skipper dismissed without troubling the scorers. One run was added before MD joined the party bowling Vanchinathan for a duck. Davis picked up two more and was hunting for a 5fer, with Colfs number 5 Faruk Patel also closing in on a 50 and in addition to all that Colfs number 11 Jagger was and this is a quote, attempting to ‘conquer… [his] Belal demons.’ Unfortunately for NT there was drop off his bowling and unfortunately for Patel he chipped a ball off Belal to Ronnie who greedily snaffled it at short cover to bring Hayes to a 108-run victory. Fortunately, for Jagger, he has for now at least conquered his Belal demons.

No ‘pressos’ again, for reasons, but captain Warne in his changing room debrief with the senior players selected Tom Davis as his PotM for his 4-14. Next week the 3s are off to Bexley Park to play Blue Star who last season were promoted with Hayes and took the league down to the wire, with much excitement as now captain Couldrey, his brother and 3s Keeper Millard provided ball by ball updates of Blue Star v Sidcup having finished play in the 2s on the last game of the year.

Notable performances:

H(K)CC

1. Davis 6-1-14-4
2. Rowson 30 (41)
3. Millard 30 (27)

OCCC

F.Patel 41 (57) and 2 catches

1. Ghataore 9-0-29-4