Scorecard

Phoenix RFC v Cookham Dean Cricket Club Friendly 1st XI on Sun 30 Aug 2020 at 1.30pm
Cookham Dean Cricket Club Lost by 31 runs

Match report A return to the good old bad old days for Cookham Sunday XI with a day that will live long in the memory for all the wrong reasons. Cookham fielded a team with too many Richardson’s in it, and they would pay a heavy price for this short-sighted team selection, with a display reminiscent of the darkest days in the club’s long history.

Cookham arrived in good spirits off the back of avoiding an embarrassing defeat to a team of comedians the week before, and on seeing the mud bath of a rugby pitch that the Phoenix Groundsman had prepared Captain Richardson won the toss and decided to stick Phoenix in. The decision quickly looked justified as Toby Lemon and Frazer Finlan ripped though the top order, making regular break throughs.

First changed spinner, D’Ardenne entered the attack and immediately produced one of the balls of the season to bowl the Phoenix captain Dainty for 7, who finally departed following a short disagreement as to whether the ball had in fact clipped the bail, such was the ridiculousness of the delivery. D’Ardenne continued with a fine spell of bowling to rip through the lower middle order, only slightly tarnished by the fact he failed to know any of the younger members of the Cookham’s squad names and resorted to pointing and shouting ‘Sam 1’, ‘Sam 2’ and ‘Sam 3.’ One of D’Ardenne’s victims, loudly shouted ‘Oh you sl*g’ in a Danny Dyer esc voice as he spooned the ball up in the air for a simple catch, much to the amusement of the Cookham team. D’Ardenne was assisted at the other end by a good spell of bowling by Ben Willis.

With Phoenix already 9 down for 80 odd, inside 25 overs, the forgotten man of Cookham Dean cricket club, Dan Matthews (Aka ‘The Count’) entered the attack and bowled like he had never been away, immediately producing an edge to gully which was dropped by a diving D’Ardenne, clearly realising that the catch would deny him a 5fer at the other end! In the next over Matthews returned the favour by dropping a skyer off D’Ardenne’s bowling. This game of cat and mouse finally came to an end when Hughes took a catch off The Count’s next over to ensure D’Ardenne wouldn’t get his 5-wicket haul. Phoenix finished on 87 all out, with the unusual statistic of the 3 Richardson brothers taking 5 catches between them, which was particularly unexpected given the family’s reputation in the field.

With such a low target to chase, the Cookham players sat smugly at the break, eagerly awaiting a quick run chase. How wrong the complacent team were!

Mettler and Hughes opened the innings, but both were quickly dismissed, exposing the Richardson heavy middle order. Brothers Jake and Joel both went without troubling the scorers leaving Cookham in a precarious position at 13 for 4. Sam Rollett was joined by Toby Lemon who produced the only partnership of note in Cookham’s disastrous reply, moving the score onto 43 for 4 and settling the teams frayed nerves.

However, when the partnership was ended, Cookham’s ‘firewood’ lower middle order and tail were exposed. Isaac Richardson entered the fray knowing he would need to score at least 6 to ensure the Richardson family wouldn’t end the day with more catches than collective runs to their name. Having scraped passed this precarious milestone, Captain Richardson was out for 7, leaving Cookham reeling at 52 for 8. Any faint hopes of victory were quickly expunged as the tail of D’Ardenne, Matthews and Willis were all dismissed cheaply leaving Frazer Finlan as the not out batsman with no partners left to produce a heroic display.

Serious questions must be asked of the captain, the management and the entire side after such a terrible batting display, with no doubt serious changes expected ahead of next week.

Phoenix RFC Batting
Player name RunsMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 10 wickets
0
87 (26.3 overs)		     
Raj b  Lemon 0
T Middleton ct  Richardson b D'Ardenne 14
T Betts b  Lemon 20
T Hilling ct  Richardson b Lemon 4
S Datta ct  Richardson b Finlan 0
D Dainty b  D'Ardenne 12
S Hollistor ct  Richardson b D'Ardenne 6
S Krish b  D'Ardenne 6
T Porter ct  Richardson b Willis 8
L Addinell Not Out  1
A Pareek ct  Hughes b Matthews 5

Cookham Dean Cricket Club Friendly 1st XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Toby Lemon7.0130310.004.29
Frazer Finlan6.01818.001.33
Simon D'Ardenne7.021644.002.29
Ben Willis5.0027127.005.40
Daniel Matthews1.30111.000.67

Cookham Dean Cricket Club Friendly 1st XI Batting
Player Name RMB4s6sSRCatchesStumpingsRun outs
extras
TOTAL :
2w 3lb 
for 10 wickets
5
56		        
Rob Mettler ct  Hilling b Addinell 2
Iwan Hughes b  Raj 4 1
Sam Rollett ct  & b Sri 19
Joel Richardson b  Raj 0 2
Jake Richardson ct  Dainty b Addinell 0 1
Toby Lemon ct  Datta b Porter 16 2
Isaac Richardson ct  Betts b Sri 7 1 2
Simon D'Ardenne b  Sri 2
Daniel Matthews b  Sri 1
Ben Willis ct  Middleton b Hilling 0
Frazer Finlan Not Out  0

Phoenix RFC Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Raj7.03924.501.29
Addinell7.0222211.003.14
Porter5.0217117.003.40
Sri6.04340.750.50
Hilling1.50212.001.09