Ley Hill U'14s vs Great Kingshill U'14s , 25th June 2004 &
Ley Hill U'14s vs Winslow U'14s, 2 July 2004

Ian Walter

Under 14s' winning run comes to an end as defeats against Great Kingshill and Winslow kill off county championship hopes!

After an opening sequence of five successive victories (four in the league) you can tell that it has come to an abrupt end because:

(a)    the amount of time that has lapsed since the last match report; and

(b)   a complete absence of enthusiastic volunteers to write something (despite many prompts)!

So for the sake of posterity, I write to record a six wicket defeat against Great Kingshill on 25 June despite a brave effort.

Much of the blame must go to the annual mass exodus of campers from Ley Hill to a field in Oxfordshire somewhere for alleged mysterious pagan celebrations coinciding with the Midsummer Solstice. This robbed us of several regulars (Craig, Ollie Mace and James Lowe) and with Stephen also away on a school jolly a huge batting responsibility rested on skipper Ben Ford’s shoulders.

He didn’t disappoint! Electing to bat Ben led the way with a magnificent 61 before the game turned with a sensational run out from a prostrate fielder at point with still over six overs still remaining. The impetus went and the Hill eventually managed a commendable 116 for 7 in the circumstances.

Great Kingshill then went about their business very efficiently despite Sam Harrison grabbing a couple of early wickets and others for Sam Helm and Alex Wallis but they reached their target with over three overs remaining.

Qualification for the county final (almost certainly against Amersham) is now down to the game against Winslow.

So on 2 July, a cold, blustery Friday evening, we met at 4.30 to head off for a 6pm start at Winslow. Negotiating Aylesbury’s ‘rush hour’ was not as bad as anticipated, but this transpired to be the only piece of luck we had all evening.

Ley Hill again won the toss and after consulting various weather charts decided to bat. Ben and Stephen soon had 20 on the board but then Ben was unexpectedly bowled and Ollie Mace and Craig soon proved that they had obviously not been practising their batting during their ‘camping’ expedition. Wickets were falling regularly, including poor Richard Falconer’s during a particularly heavy squally shower that disproved all the weather forecasts, and runs were proving very hard to come by in the storm.  

Throughout the mayhem Stephen stood firm and together with Ollie Runswick took the score from 40 to 85 with a crucial sixth wicket partnership. Eventually we finished on 95 for 8, with Stephen giving his wicket away at the death for a well-crafted 46 and Ollie making 9. At least we had something to bowl at, which didn’t look likely at one time.

Then of course the wind dropped, the skies cleared and instead of the opposition batting in pitch black with howling wind and rain (as planned of course) conditions were ideal. Craig took an early wicket but with the score on about 20 and Winslow’s two best batsmen at the crease the game was effectively decided by the Winslow umpire who was the only person in Winslow who didn’t think their county batsman was run out by Ollie Runswick. Even the batsman kept walking, only to be called back by the umpire. It was 69 when the second wicket eventually fell and despite some tighter bowling towards the end by Chris Morris, Ben and Stephen, Winslow reached their target with six wickets and two overs left.

So the dream ended as we finished third, one point behind both Great Kingshill and Winslow. Still, at least we were saved from a very probable humiliation at the hands of Amersham, a side awash with county players.

Well done lads; a great effort that has put Ley Hill on the map at this level. Let’s see if we can win one or two friendlies now.