Scorecard

St Albans Cricket Club Sunday 1st XI v Hemel Hempstead CC on Sun 25 May 2025 at 1pm
St Albans Cricket Club Won 206 runs

Match report Match Report: Sunday 1s vs Hemel Hempstead
Normally, the "Dick of the Day" is punished by having to write the match report. Luckily for Rory and his Saturday night antics, this week’s responsibility was decided by a thrilling Bank Holiday golf match — a tense skins game between Lawrence, Mulvaney, and Baylis that went down to the final hole.
With Josh already safe, Baylis had to win the final hole to avoid the grueling punishment. Lawrence, with the honour off the tee, played conservatively, hitting a 4-iron up the left-hand side of the short par-5 9th at Essendon. Baylis, visibly nervous after struggling off the tee all round, stepped up next. Taking out his driver, he boldly declared, “Pressure is for tyres,” before booming a 300-yard drive straight down the middle.
Josh, having already won the match, decided to celebrate early by snap-hooking his drive somewhere in the direction of St Albans.
Unable to reach the green in two, Lawrence laid up to leave himself a wedge in, knowing a par should be enough. Baylis, sitting pretty, knew he needed birdie. From 200 yards, he pulled out a 6-iron — and promptly shanked it perfectly short of the bunker, leaving a delicate chip over the trap with water looming behind the green.
From here, Lawrence capitulated, fluffing his pitch into the bunker. Baylis responded by sticking his chip to within 10 feet, two-putting for par. Lawrence splashed out, leaving himself a 20-footer to halve the hole and leave Baylis writing this very report. The putt had perfect pace and looked in all the way — until it missed agonisingly on the low side. Baylis roared with joy, and the skipper couldn’t believe he’d bottled it on the last.

Back to the Cricket
This week saw the long-awaited return of the Hertfordshire’s Premier Cricket League. The Saints fielded a strong side against last year’s champions, Hemel Hempstead — a team full of familiar faces after the 2s played them the day before.
Following a relatively tame night at Boot/Swan for most of the squad, everyone looked fresh at the meet time — particularly Baylis, who was spotted at 11:30 AM in the bar, sat alone, tucking into a Simmons with a half pint while watching highlights of last year’s thumping of Boxmoor to get himself in the mood.
A smooth setup (including moving the boundary) and both teams’ eagerness to get going meant the toss was brought forward. With league rules now requiring each team to provide an umpire or face points deductions, our own panel-quality umpire Joe Curran stepped up. Unfortunately, the Hemel captain called heads correctly — disaster. Stranger still, he chose to bowl. Had Lawrence done the same, he might not have made it out of the dressing room alive.
Baylis and Winners strode to the crease in their iconic yellow pads, facing the same opening pair the 2s had struggled with the day before — the same pair that kept Pez scoreless for 30 balls. But a different mindset and some early gubbing from Baylis, alongside technically sound strokes from Winners, saw the Saints off to a flyer — 55-0 off 10.
Sadly, Baylis’ weekend caught up with him. Barely awake, he spooned one to cover trying to flat-bat a short ball for a well-made 32 — cementing his place at the top of the order for the season. West joined next and, after a scratchy start and some opposition chirps (thanks to JC telling them our openers were tailenders), he silenced the doubters with a booming cover drive before being bowled for 19.
Ahaan came in and rotated the strike nicely for Winners, who was now flying — standing practically on the offside wide line and mowing everything to leg. Unfortunately, he forgot to consider the risk of hitting his own stumps and, when trying to play one behind square, middled it straight into leg stump for an entertaining 79.
Ahaan followed soon after with the score on 168-4 off 25, and with arguably our best batsmen still in the shed, the Saints eyed up 300. Hemel seemed keen to help us get there, offering up some truly dire bowling. Sims and Mulvaney capitalised with brutal hitting, including switch-hits and general chaos. Contributions from Rory added to the tally, and the Saints cruised to 326 — though confidence in defending it wasn’t sky-high.

After a quick shandy and hydration break, Murph and Dan Harvey took the new ball. Unfortunately for the off-spinner, Hemel opened with a leftie — something Murph loudly insisted he couldn’t bowl to. DH should’ve had a wicket in his first over, strangling the opener down the leg side, but Lawrence decided to volleyball it down instead.
Murph then threw up a juicy full toss, which the batter somehow missed — clearly not something he sees in the Championship — and was on his way back to the pavilion.
DH continued to bowl tight lines (and most importantly at a ridiculous over rate), picking up two more wickets thanks to excellent slip catches from Baylis and Winfield. With Hemel at 3 down, Murph decided it was time for some googlies — much to Baylis’ amusement at first slip. Incredibly, he was rewarded, with the Hemel No. 5 strolling past a ball so slow he might’ve had time to get back before Lawrence stumped him.
Badsy replaced DH and quickly made another breakthrough, using the one that rolls to deadly effect off his shortened Sunday run. At 72-5, Hemel seemed determined to make us stay out there for 45 overs.
Ahaan came on fresh off a 3-fer for the 2s and quickly got into rhythm. In a comedic three-ball sequence, Badsy was smoked for 4 at midwicket, Simsy dropped one at gully, and finally Rory caught one drilled straight to him at mid-on. Badsy got another thanks to more solid work in the slips, and Hemel were reeling at 83-7.
Their No. 9 seemed torn between blocking and swinging wildly. After one agricultural swipe, his partner shouted for him to calm down — which he did, gently patting a floated half-volley from Ahaan back to him, much to the delight of the now-expanded slip cordon, who praised him with shouts of “Good boy!”
The final three wickets fell in quick succession. Ahaan picked up two more, and Westy — galloping in off his full run-up — got the last. Hemel were bowled out for 120 in 24 overs.

A 206-run thrashing of last year’s champions — a serious statement to the league that the Sunday 1s mean business.

St Albans Cricket Club Sunday 1st XI Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
2nb 2w 1b 1lb 
for 9 wickets
6
326		        
Dan Baylis ct Rory Fraser 32 43 4 74.42 1
Jacob Winfield b Rory Fraser 79 74 14 106.76 3
Zach West b Dil Khan 19 28 1 67.86
Ahaan Dean ct Jacob Hodgins 7 11 63.64
Rory Law b Dil Khan 90 58 13 3 155.17 2
Joshua Mulvaney b Jacob Hodgins 51 28 5 2 182.14
George Sims ct Jacob Hodgins 34 18 4 2 188.89
James Lawrence ct Jacob Hodgins 4 7 57.14 1 1
Adam Murphy st Jacob Hodgins 0 1 0
Daniel Harvey  
Ben Adshead  

Hemel Hempstead CC Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Freddie Lowe7.003900.005.57
Ajay Savania6.003900.006.50
Dil Khan10.0061230.506.10
Rory Fraser7.0130215.004.29
Jacob Hodgins6.0056511.209.33
Rushil Dodhia4.003900.009.75
Lutero Corrigan1.001500.0015.00
Maxwell Clark2.001900.009.50
Tayyab Sadiq2.002600.0013.00

Hemel Hempstead CC Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
1nb 9w 4b 1lb 
for 10 wickets
15
120 (24.2 overs)		     
Lutero Corrigan lbw Adam Murphy 1 7 14.29
Tayyab Sadiq ct Daniel Harvey 10 23 2 43.48
Brad Finch ct Daniel Harvey 24 19 3 1 126.32
Maxwell Clark b Ben Adshead 15 21 2 71.43
Freddie Lowe st Adam Murphy 11 21 1 1 52.38
James Smart ct Ahaan Dean 25 23 5 108.70
Dil Khan ct Ben Adshead 4 2 1 200
Rushil Dodhia ct Ahaan Dean 0 5 0
Ajay Savania ct Ahaan Dean 5 15 33.33
Rory Fraser Not Out  0 5 0
Jacob Hodgins ct Zach West 10 7 1 1 142.86

St Albans Cricket Club Sunday 1st XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Daniel Harvey6.031226.002.00
Adam Murphy8.0153226.506.63
Ben Adshead4.001829.004.50
Ahaan Dean4.002337.675.75
Zach West2.20919.003.86

  • Umpire :
    JC
  • Scorer :
    All