Scorecard

Welwyn Garden City 4XI v St Albans Cricket Club 4XI on Sat 18 Jun 2022 at 13:00
St Albans Cricket Club Won by 114 runs

Match report It felt like a bad toss to lose and Skipper Andy Saunders duly lost it . On a cold , damp , overcast day on a municipal pitch in the Welwyn hinterlands, and with a team stuffed full of bowlers fielding was the preferred option but into bat the Saints went .

Saunders was perplexed about who to appoint as openers , there were no obvious candidates , and in the end volunteers were called for .

Moksy Islam (obviously) was the first to stick his hand up and after some gentle encouragement veteran bowler Nadeem Arif also stepped forward .

We didn't really know what to expect but what we got was fireworks . Well , initially fireworks from Moksy as the opening pair raced into a 40 run partnership .... of which Moksy scored 36 , mostly in boundaries and including some breathtaking shots; a glorious in/out off drive for six was the pick of the bunch .

Nadeem soon woke up though and played beautifully , putting the bad balls away clinically as his accumulated steadily .

At drinks Saints were 125-2 at drinks with Moksy falling for a notable 69 , and Nadeem for an equally impressive 66.

Zach Tarrant playing his first league match of the season was out early which brought Najib Khan in for a classy 44 , full of his trademark , wristy cuts, drives and pulls .

James Lawrence added a forceful 29 with others chipping in for an impressive total after 40 overs of 251-7.

The decision to lose the toss was looking like a masterstroke from Saunders .

After 'tea' in the cold in the somewhat gloomy surroundings Prath Khatavkar with Tim Winfield . The former bowled 8 overs of nagging line and length that earned a wicket and an economy rate of 1.62. The older man , bowling up the incline bowler 6 solid overs and unusually for him didn't take any scalps .

The onus was very much on getting 20 overs in to constitute a game before any rain could render the batting heroics useless and there was plenty of hustle to get round and at the end of each set . And it was this intensity that certainly put the batsmen under pressure as young Jamie Spelling came on and ripped through the middle order taking an impressive 4-24 in his 8 overs .

A shout out to Prathamesh 'PD' Deshpande too, whose 8 overs while only yielding 1 wicket went at a miserly rate.

By the time first Sam Davey and then Saunders came on to bowl the 20 overs were in the bag and the game was won . Both bowlers ended up delivering their final sets in the rain with Saunders annoyance at two comical near collisions in the field resulting in dropped catches tempered with a wicket for him as an ill advised sweep shot saw the batsman clean bowled. With his glasses obscured with rain he elected to bowl the final 6 balls as fast as possible to "get this game done"

Handshakes all round and then off to the relative warmth and dry of the changing rooms where a cold and soggy 4XI celebrated 5th win in the last 6 league matches and second in the table .

St Albans Cricket Club 4XI Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
1nb 7w 1b 2lb 
for 8 wickets
11
251		        
Nadeem Arif Run out  66
Moksudul Islam ct Galvin 69
Zachary Tarrant ct Galvin 1
Najib Khan ct Muhktar 44
James Lawrence b Doran 29
Sam Davey ct Muhktar 2
Prathamesh Deshpande ct Vine 4
Prath Khatavkar Not Out  19
Tim Winfield ct Howes 2
Jamie Speller Not Out  4
Andy Saunders  

Welwyn Garden City 4XI Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
R.Dolan7.0050150.007.14
P.Howes7.0040140.005.71
D.Galvin8.0035217.504.38
M.Shah5.003800.007.60
U. Muhktar8.0049224.506.12
M. Vine5.003000.006.00

Welwyn Garden City 4XI Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
1nb 1w 2b 1lb 
for 7 wickets
5
137 (40.0 overs)		     
T.Edwards lbw Khatavkar 6
M. Priolo st Deshpande 40
K. Shah ct Speller 7
S. Willis Not Out  36
S. Patel ct Speller 8
U. Muhktar lbw Speller 0
M.Vine ct Speller 2
M. Sanders b Saunders 24
D. Calvin Not Out  10
R. Dolan  
P. Howes  

St Albans Cricket Club 4XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Prath Khatavkar8.0213113.001.62
Tim Winfield6.012700.004.50
Prathamesh Deshpande8.0119119.002.37
Jamie Speller8.002446.003.00
Sam Davey6.002800.004.67
Andy Saunders4.0016116.004.00