Accrington 3rds 2006

Saturday 17th June 2006
Accrington 176-?, Burnley 175-8
I managed to lose the toss and was asked to field first. It was another warm and sticky day and today we were pitted against an opposition that has won all 5 of their previous games. With the side that I had out today I was quietly confident that we would spring a surprise.

The opposition came from Burnley.

In the field both Matt ‘Ive figured out I'm not black’ Donners (1-32) and Toq ‘the brain dead doc’ Hussain (4-27) bowled with real pace and bounce making it awkward and uncomfortable for the Burnley batters and within no time the Accy bowlers incinerated a line up that has been living on past glories. We had them on the racks at 44-6 off 20 overs. Guess What?

We as a team released the pressure and decided to field like dysfunctionally cross eyed epileptic tortoises……….giving the distinct impression that we had fridges on our backs! A seventh wicket partnership of 80 took the score to 124 before they ended up on 175-8! Overthrows, ‘non existent walking in’ or should I say sleep walking as several players were mentally switched off (Spenny is the only one to be excused on the latter point, as you need to have a brain in the first place to be mentally switched off!) a couple of dropped catches and general shoddiness all resulted in Burnley getting 60-80 more than they should have.

Luckily our opening batters put on a partnership of 68 and at 141-3 we looked comfortable until we lost our next 4 wickets for 10 runs. Luckily Toq (22*) and Matt (17*) came to the rescue with the bat this time and guided us home. Waqas ‘is it gel or something else that is dripping off my head’ Ahmed was top scorer with a cultivated 53, followed by myself (29) and then Jonny ‘I cant take the mick out of him because his dad wont understand’ Hayhurst with 26. A very good win in the end, roll on the thirds ‘juggernaut’!