17 May 2008 - Lindow 2nd XI vs Barnton
PATE HAS OPPOSITION ON TOAST BEFORE BARNTON-STORMING BATTING WINS THE DAY
A game played out under Armageddon-esque skies and more than occasional drizzle ended in a defeat for Lindow in their top of the table second XI clash at Barnton.
The earlier batting heroics of Alex Pate were in vain, as a Catholic Priest-like lack of penetration with the old ball saw the home side to victory with eight wickets and 4.2 overs in hand.
The toss was won by the visitors, who elected to bat. Rob Fernyhough and Graeme Coldwell opened up, and it was attritional stuff, though the runs were starting to come a little easier when Coldwell played round a full ball to be bowled by Ollier for 10. He quickly snared Fernyhough (14) and Adam Clarke (3) to leave Lindow 31-3 after 13 overs. Mini recoveries came in the form of Matt Hoyle (16), Sam Burrows (14) and Dave Kendrick (18), and the score was 81-5 when Pate came to the crease. Making the only substantial score of the innings, 52, he and Ben Gedroge (10) put on 35 for the seventh wicket and the score was nursed to what seemed a competitive 163 all out in the last over. As would become apparent though, a little more application from one or two of the batsmen could have boosted the total and made what was to follow a more testing experience for the home side.
Utilising the new ball quite superbly at times, Pate and Chris Wearne kept the ball up to the bat and, on occasion, made it talk, Wearne at one point almost decapitating first slip with one that went off the seam and Whitehouse was bowled by Pate with one moved the proverbial country mile. Unfortunately, this was the only batting failure, though you would have been hard pressed to predict that at the halfway stage of the innings. The run rate had been kept below two an over, and the rate required was up towards the run a ball mark. Thirlwell had played the occasional argricultural shot, but also more classical ones on his way to 37, but his dismissal only brought usual first teamer Watkins to the wicket. He stroked his way effortlessly to 48 and saw things home in tandem with Noden. Noden’s innings (and, indeed, the Barnton innings as a whole) was an object lesson in how to pace a run chase. He was virtually strokeless until the drinks break, scoring at less than a run every four balls, but he broke out afterwards and took his score to 70, hitting the winning runs as the darkness closed in.
