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Denham 1st XI v Chalfont St Giles 1st XI

June 10th 2006

James Nicholas's Report

A Cracking Game!

The toss was as important as it ever could be.

Batting first meant an afternoon out of the scorching sunshine watching England's World Cup opener against Paraguay. Captain James Nicholas spun the coin high into the air, 'Tails' was the call from the Chalfont skipper. The ten pence piece fell to the ground, rolled agonisingly down the wicket on its edge, before toppling over to reveal a shiny tail and confine Denham to 3 and a half hours in the field with no football.

Tidy opening spells from Grover and Mahmood resticted Chalfont early on, but wickets were hard to come by. Denham's fielding could have been better but it can be excused to some extent due to the tough conditions.

Usman made mid-innings breakthroughs to produce fine figures of 2-11 from 8 overs, which helped stop the dangerous Chalfont middle order from pulling away. Jamil Shaikh and James then managed to keep the reigns on at the end of the innings with 3-66 and 2-38 unrespectivly. League leaders Chalfont had been restricted to 209/9 from their 52 overs, a superb effort by all 5 of Denham's bowlers in such difficult conditions.

In reply, Denham were always up with the run-rate but kept losing wickets. Khan made 46, but when he fell to Stannard with the score on 124/5 Denham looked in trouble. However a crucial 53 run partnership from Jamil 'I'll show you!' Shaikh (40 n.o) and Nicholas (25) put the home side back in with a chance.

There were around 30 to win with 6 overs remaining. Joe O'Hara fell without troubling the scorers and Denham were back in trouble. Ambrose would have been the next man in, but he had been suffering all afternoon with a rash believed to have been caused by Bobby Rai's sun cream. I wonder what was in it! Bring on Akhil Saberwhal. Three glorious consecutive boundaries from Saberwhal (18 n.o), and an excellent effort from Jamil who remained unbeaten, helped Denham to a fantastic victory with an over to spare, and bring Chalfont their 1st League defeat of the season.

Next week Holyport!

Littlewick Green 2nd XI v Denham 2nd XI

June 10th 2006

Skipper Mark Dalton's Report

The Cricketers, Littlewick Green

On the hottest day of the year (and the day of England's opening World Cup game) skipper Dalton had the temerity to lose the toss (again) and have his team put in the field for what turned out to be a long, hot, ball chasing afternoon.

Fielding a somewhat weakened team due to 1st XI call ups the omens did not look good. 50 overs later and undefeated Littlewick Green declared on 260 for 6. Elsam (95) and Anderson (71) did most of the damage as did 'extras' (45).

The whole team toiled bravely under the mid afternoon sun with alll bowlers working hard including Atwal (9-1-45-0) for a very respectable spell, Schembri (5-0-17-1) for his wobblers that had the required effect, Sethi (11-2-40-3) who nicked out the tiring Elsam in the nineties and O'Hara (11-0-61-2), Simpson (8-0-59-0) and Ashworth (6-0-30-0) for running in when needed. Special mention to 'keeper Payne who made valiant and body bruising efforts to try and prevent 'extras' being the third highest score.

260 was always going to too much even for our fabled, star studded batting line up. Dalton (21) and Simpson (12) opened and briefly alll looked well: 40 for 0 off 8 overs maybe just maybe ? Then Dalton missed a straight one, Braithwaite (1) perished on the pull and Simpson lost his off stump. Payne (13), the juggler JK (31) and Schembri (35) with support from the tail did an excellent job to keep the Littlewick attack at bay. We settled for a well earned draw after batting out our 50 overs for 158 for 8.

Champagne Moment: on a day short of exuberant highlights this week's CM goes to Sethi for removing Elsam's off stump to prevent the rotund opener from getting his ton! Well Done.

Result: A losing draw, Littlewick Green 16 pts Denham 6 pts.

A tough game on a hot day.

Sunday XI Versus Brondesbury Casuals:

Sunday 11th June

DENHAM FAR FROM CASUAL - RUSSELL BOWRY HITS A TON

Denham scored a fine victory against Brondesbury Casuals on Sunday after winning the toss and asking the opposition to bowl on a hot afternoon.

Russell Bowry started like a train and the opening partnership of 69 was reached in only 12 overs. After Sir Stuart Payne was bowled and Joe O'Hara fell cheaply, James Nicholas joined Russell to continue the onslaught, and the pair weren't separated until the score had reached 182, with James scoring a valuable 50.

Russell reached his century soon after and ended with a magnificent 127, gaining further support from Richie Braithwaite (18 N.O.) Unfortunately, the rest of the batting proved feeble, yet the total of 234 for 9 was to prove daunting to the Casuals.

Denham's positive cricketing brain Bobby Rai opened the bowling with his leg spin, which proved effective. It was the perfect foil for Gerald O'Hara at the other end, as he made inroads into the Casuals batting with 3 for 40.

Despite some strong hitting against an attack dominated by spinners (or at least slow bowling),wickets fell steadily. "Hearts in mouth" catching heroics were completed by Phil Ashworth, Hemen Mehta and Alan Coulson. Even with several chances being missed near the end, Denham completed their victory, dismissing the Casuals for 162.

Bowling successes were Bobby (1 for27), Hemen (1 for 26), Harish Bhatt (2 for 7), James (2 for 13) and Joe (1 for 23). Alan claimed 4 victims behind the stumps.