Tuesday 4 September 2007

County Cricket at Canterbury

This afternoon Kent played Surrey in the NatWest Pro40 - Division Two, at The St Lawrence Ground. Four of the "Bockhill Birders" went along to support Kent, and it tuned out to be an exciting game.
Kent won the toss and decided to bat. The umpires, Rob Bailey and Richard Kettleborough go out to the middle, followed by the Surrey team.

There was a poor start for Kent loosing three wickets for 18 runs, before Darren Stevens, above, and Martin Van Jaarsfeld slowly began to rebuild the innings

After they were out it was left to Geraint Jones and James Treadwell to try to get Kent to a reasonable total, with the help of the tail. In the end 159 for 8 seemed to few to be a problem for Surrey. We were all a little disappointed, particularly with the lack of urgency ken put into their running between the wickets.

The Surrey inning took place under floodlights and they too lost two early wickets. However the class of Mark Butcher and Scott Newman kept them ahead of the run rate; above Butcher faces Simon Cook. Things changed when the Kent spinners, Treadwell and Van Jaarsveld, came on, and both slowed the run rate and took wickets.

Scott Newman, watched here by Kent Captain Rob Key, batted through the whole Surrey innings and we arrived at the last over with Surrey needing just two runs with four wickets in hand. Neil Dexter bowled the last over and three wickets, an LBW, a stumping and a run-out meant that Surrey needed two from two balls. Mohammad Akram came in as last man and managed to scramble the single that allowed Newman to calmly secure a nail-biting victory. The defeat all but ends Kent's hopes of gaining promotion to the First Division next season. We did see a few Pied Wagtails flying across the ground as dusk approaches, presumably to a communal roost near by and there were a few ducks around, but these were on the score card. In the end Scott Newman's brilliant innings led Surrey to a thrilling win but it was bad luck on Kent as the team had fought back and came so close to snatching a surprise victory.

1 comment:

Kingsdowner said...

Incredible last over - but Kent really needed more runs on the board.
After being a member a few years ago, I haven't seen a game this season. Must try harder next year.