Washington Cricket Club - 40th Anniversary Year

A beautiful day and ground greeted the Wash in their return to Oxford to play old foes Lord Gnome. Lord Gnome won the toss and elected to bat and got off to a great start with some good hitting by Sanderson who raced to 59 with runs from Kloss (10,0,42,0 although unlucky to have one dropped) and Nick Tidey (6,2,28,0...great to have Nick back). However he ran out of steam due to some long boundaries and throwing the bat resulting in the inevitable as Rob Tidey's introduction saw him bowled.

Jon SanJose also made a welcome return and with the dismissal of Sanderson, the Wash started to make inroads into the Lord Gnome order. SanJose (10,13,27,2) quickly had Dunthorpe and Glasby caught behind by Kiwi Harris. Gluckman (5,0,29,0) bowled some tidy overs prior to lunch however it was the introduction of Relf who seized the initiative with accurate bowling which saw Nick Tidey take an early candidate for catch of the year followed by additional catches by Nick, Rob Tidey and Cruickshank. Rob Tidey (10,1,50,2) bowled George with his second spell and Relf bowled Clargo to finish with 9 for 32 in 9 overs.

Lord Gnome finished at 9 for 215 in their 50 overs which was a good target although the Wash was confident with their strong lineup.

Davis opened with Braniff who was bowled for 2 followed by Davis for 12, Naseem for 11 and Cruickshank for 1 which saw the Wash struggling at 4 for 51 after 19 overs. Rob Tidey combined with Harris to add 33 in short order before Harris was caught bringing Nick Tidey to the crease.

The brothers combined to add nearly 50 with some great shots by both until Rob Tidey was guilty of attempting to sweep too often and was caught in Pietersen-like fashion for 37.

Nick was then run out for 22 trying to push the tempo as the Wash needed 6 an over off the last 12. Sanjose started promising but was caught for 5 followed by Kloss for 10 leaving Relf and Gluckman needing 70 off the last 7 overs with one wicket.

The guys dug in and although victory was now out of reach, batted oiut the innings nicely with both hitting nice boundaries and finishing not out with Gluckman 5 and Relf 14.

Skipper Harris said later that "we definitely should have won this with the team today but it just isn't looking like our year".

Man of the Match - Ian Relf for his maiden Wash Fifer

Packing the Kit - Chris Davis for dropping an absolute sitter although the oppo failing to tell us prior to the game that the match fee was 240 quid should certainly see them considered for this honour.