Cross Arrows vs Wycombe House Cricket Club at Lords

Wycombe House win in one of the most amazing games to be hosted at Lords’.

It was a great end to what has been a difficult season for Wycombe House with a historic and memorable win at the home of Cricket Lords. In an invitational game against the Cross Arrows, Wycombe House won the toss and elected to bowl first.

Making the most of the fantastic wicket and lightning quick outfield; the Cross Arrows began with an aggressive innings by their opening pair of Palairet and Maddock who got the hosts off to a flying start.

The introduction of Ben Taylor into the bowling attack helped stop the flow of runs and with some tight disciplined bowling from Salman Choudhry (10-0-34-0) Wycombe House began to peg back the hosts somewhat. A wicket for Alex Thamby and two for Ben Taylor (The second being a wonderful catch by the Substitute Tindy Gill) left the hosts at 147-3 after getting to almost 100 with no loss at 8 an over.

Sanjit Sandhu’s introduction into the bowling attack was memorable; he seamed the ball both directions and had even the settled Palairet in trouble before clean bowling both he and Gibb in the middle to late overs. The batsmen were quite often found wanting and missing his deliveries; demonstrating the value of a good seam bowler.

Sanjit Sandhu (10-0-61-2) and Prashant Patel bowled the death overs and Patel began by being hit for two 4s in his first two deliveries. He recovered to take a wicket (5-0-26-1) and together they helped restrict the Cross Arrows who made 61 runs in the last 10 overs with plenty of wickets in hand to take their score up to a competitive 289 (With average scores on the ground being around 350, including a few scores nearing 400 it was a very respectable bowling effort from Wycombe House).

Despite the loss of early wickets to the Cross Arrows opening bowler Milo Wilkin and first change spin bowler Palairet, Wycombe House set about the run chase in fine style. Ben Taylor set the platform with a well thought out 57 in 56 balls. Following Ben’s dismissal (Score of 67-4 in 14 overs) youngster Kushal Gor (who batted with a knee injury and a runner) was joined by Prashant Patel and together they consolidated the middle order to keep the target in sight. Gor carried on to make 77 from 100 deliveries after Patel was out for 81 in 72 balls at 208-5 in 38 overs. With 82 required in 12 overs (Just under 7 an over) the lower order were carried by Gor, but a late flurry of wickets meant that the dream win looked to be drifting away until number 11 Salman Choudhry stepped to the crease. With 37 required in the last two overs, Choudhry began by striking his first delivery faced for 6 into the car park. With some lusting hitting he brought the target back in sight with 22 required from the last over with Captain Zahid Ahmed on strike. With 3 balls of the game remaining Wycombe House required 18 runs to win and it looked all over. However Salman Choudhry had other ideas, smashing three sixes off the last three balls to give Wycombe House an astonishing win; which will no doubt be talked about at Lords for years to come.  Salman Choudhry finished with 33 off just 8 balls and Wycombe House won by 1 wicket.

Man of the Match: Salman Choudhry for his economical bowling figures of 10-0-34-0 and 33 runs off only 8 balls (A strike rate of over 4 runs per delivery, which included four 6’s and two 4’s). 

See below link to Cross Arrows web site:
http://www.lords.org/fixtures/matches/cross-arrows-cricket-club,591,AR.html

To see the winning runs being hit please click here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KB5C5Lc1W4s