Sat 11th June 2011

HCL RD3SW

Sway II survive Suttoners scare

Suttoners II 91ao, Sway II 165-8. Sway won by 74 runs

Sway seconds travelled to Slade's farm to face rock bottom Suttoners II and despite winning relatively comfortably, they were given a real scare by a battling Suttoners side. Sway batted first on a wicket that despite a recent shower, was rock hard and appeared a decent batting track. Suttoners opening bowler T Saunders ran down the slope and bowlied with real pace and accuracy that soon gave Sway a nasty wake up call if they thought the game was going to be a walk. Sway openers Rick How and Dan Stevenson held him off reasonably well but with the score on 25, Rick How was cleaned up for 11. On form number 3 Chris Hammond seemed to be going along nicely with Stevenson, but when he was bowled by the spinner Nye by a ball that either turned a mile or hit something, Sway proceeded to suffer a huge wobble as two more wickets were lost in quick succession. First Ed Golding was bowled by Nye, then Dave Marshall feathered a ball off Saunders through to the keeper. Sway were now on 58-5 and facing one of the shocks of the season. The new youthful batting pair of Will Woodfine and Sam Nailor set about digging in and ensuring that Sway batted the 42 overs. This they did with maturity beyond their years in a 71 run partnership which combined watchful defence with punishing the relatively rare bad balls. By the time Nailor was bowled for 39, Sway had moved the score on to 129 and Suttoners heads if not dropping, were certainly not as perky as previously. Steve Hannibal did not trouble the scorers but Terry Patch (13*) and Woodfine (49*) accelerated the scoring over the final few overs leave Sway on a reasonable if not prolific total of 165-8  - setting Suttoners a target of 3.95 per over.

If Sway were not firing on all cylinders with the bat, they did a much better job with the ball. From the start opening pairing of Sam Nailor and Matt Bramwell gave the Suttoners openers very little to work with. Nailor running down the slope was able to generate decent pace, whilst Bramwell up the slope was delivering line and length. With runs at a premium, the pressure told when the experienced J Baveridge drove a Bramwell delivery straight to Marshall at mid on. The next over Nailor bowled the other opener to leaver Suttons in trouble at 15-2. C Rickman and G Budden dug in and kept Suttoners in the game moving the score on to 47, albeit relatively slowly. Terry Patch had then been given the nod to bowl down the slope and was soon in amongst the wickets. The extra zip and bounce had Suttoners in all sorts of bother. Skipper Pete Bennet took one behind the stumps and Chris Hammond took two sharp catches at first slip as Suttoners wickets tumbled. Nevertheless the asking rate remained a relatively unchallenging 6 or 7 and over. However,  when Budden took one risk too many was caught by a running Dave Marshall for 19 off Patch, a Sway victory looked assured. Patch went on to claim a further 2 wickets - a bowled and a catch by Golding to finish with excellent figures of 10-1-23-6. Bramwell (9-2-14-2) and Nailor 6.1-0-11-2 picked up a further wicket a piece as Suttoners crumbled to 91ao.

Will Woodfine - top notch 49 not out