Scorecard

Cockington v Erratics Cricket Club Erratics on Sun 09 Jul 2017 at 2.00pm
Erratics Cricket Club Won by 76 runs

Match report Congratulations to our fixtures secretary, Mark Phillips, for adding this game to our schedule this season. I confess I’ve often laughed at the “English Riviera” signs on the A380 on the approach to Torquay and have seen nothing of any particular beauty in the Paignton area - OK, so maybe I haven’t looked hard enough. However, I quote without irony from the village website:

“Many villages lay claim to being ‘picturesque’, but the village of Cockington is the real deal. Take a walk back in time along Cockington’s narrow lanes, lined with thatched houses and you’ll experience a quiet charm that is quintessentially English. Everything about Cockington oozes with history – there’s a water mill, a forge and even the cricket pitch was once a medieval deer park.”

There’s also a pub, called the Drum Inn, which is what prevented me from taking part in the North Devon Tour last weekend.

The cricket pitch is laid out in something of a bowl, in front of Cockington Court, a 17th century manor house which is set in 460 acres of country park.
For all of this you can read quirky, but beautiful.

Our friendly opposition invited us to bat, having explained that the heat meant they’d prefer a 30-over game. Mark Phillips struck a boundary from the first ball of the game, and half-way through that over the run-rate was 18 per over. Captain Krupakar was very happy with that. As the Cockington bowlers found their line and length, however, runs were harder to come by, though not for the imperious Ben Abrahams who fell just 7 runs short of his third century in the week, and Duncan Chave, who scored 39. We had scored 179 from our 30 overs. Would this be enough?

Hitting straight had not generally been very productive. Hitting square had been interesting at times as the ball rolled up the hill towards the boundary rope and then sometimes downwards and sideways if it failed score 4 runs.

The sightscreen from the top end took the form of Cockington Court itself, with a toddler’s birthday party in full swing right in front of it. The idea of trying to clear the line of sight behind the bowler would have been ridiculous! The setting was definitely on the informal side, but helped set the friendly manner in which the game was played.

After an excellent tea, Ben Youngman and Fraser Chave opened the bowling with 5 overs that went for a miserly 2 runs (one of which was a wide) and a wicket. Krupakar made some swift bowling changes but although runs did start to come, notably from J.Allenbrook, who top-scored with 41, every bowler that Krupakar tried took at least one wicket. This was partly thanks to some excellent fielding and great catching, with one brilliant catch on the boundary by Siva who swooped to his right and caught the ball at ankle height. At the end of their allotted 30 overs, Cockington had scored 103, for the loss of 9 wickets.

Spare a thought for Mark Phillips, who was not called on to field a ball until after the 17th over.

Spare a thought also for Danny Williamson, fielding at slip. The ball flew past or over him 4 times, at distances that were just unreachable. One drew from him a superb dive and stretch that did his already damaged shoulder no good. Instinctively doing the right thing for the team? Or for personal glory? Or just probably simply because he couldn’t help himself but go for it? He's just that kind of guy...

On another day, I think Cockington might have scored a lot more. At least three of their batsman looked very comfortable at the crease and threatened briefly before holing out. True, they were under pressure to get to the required run-rate after our first few overs, but I think things could be different next time. The two sides were more finely balanced than the eventual margin of victory might lead one to suspect.

And I hope there will be a next time. It was a great game of friendly cricket, and the good news as we chatted in the pub afterwards was that they are keen for a repeat too.

Incidentally, one of their older players used to play for Staverton and remembered games against the Erratics there. Besides remembering a cheerfully vocal wicket-keeper with a red helmet (this would be Tim Mileham, not Andrew Forrester), this player remembered bowling “a tall, bald guy who hit the ball everywhere”. On this memorable occasion, a straight drive from Chris Cook (for surely it was he) struck the bowler on the foot. As he yelped in pain, the ball ballooned up in front of him and his team-mates yelled “catch it”. The shouting brought him back to full consciousness, and seeing the ball floating in the air just in front of his face, he duly took it with both hands. The pain of the blow to his foot receded, as did the memory of the boundaries that had been struck earlier that over. We wondered if Chris might remember this particular dismissal?

Jonathan Kirby

Erratics Cricket Club Erratics Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
1nb 12w 2b 1lb 
for 5 wickets
16
179		        
Fraser Chave Bowled  12 2 1
Mark Phillips Hit Wicket  9 1
Ben Abrahams Caught  93 13
Jonathan Kirby Bowled  0
Tom Bennett-Hughes Caught  7 1
Duncan Chave Not Out  39 4 1 2
Danny Williamson Not Out  3
Jayakrupakar Nallala   1
Sivaraman Subramanian   1
Will Thornton  
Ben Youngman  

Cockington Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
No records to display.

Cockington Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
 
for 9 wickets
0
103 (30.0 overs)		     
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Erratics Cricket Club Erratics Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Ben Youngman6.02515.000.83
Fraser Chave6.031535.002.50
Will Thornton6.0135217.505.83
Sivaraman Subramanian4.0015115.003.75
Tom Bennett-Hughes5.0023123.004.60
Jayakrupakar Nallala3.01515.001.67