Petersfield v Gosport Monday 8th July 2013

Petersfield v Gosport Monday 8th July 2013

Result Petersfield won by 64 runs

After a washout 10 days earlier Petersfield travelled to Gosport on a glorious Hampshire evening. Petersfield who only had 10 men due to call ups from the under 15 team who were playing local rivals Steep on the same day lost the toss and were asked to bat first.

On a dry pitch Petersfield got off to a fast start with Ben Turk (30 retired) in particular hitting some very powerful drives through the on and off side. Alfie Casson (1) had been promoted to open after a good display in the game against Purbrook looked nervous and was out in the 4th over having not faced a lot of the strike, despite his obvious disappointment he had done the job his coach had asked him to do and allow Ben to play his shots. Captain Matt Friend (24) joined Ben at the crease and the pair of them set about the Gosport attack with Friend hitting an enormous 6 to the square leg boundary on the way to his 24. With the score on 68 and not long after Ben Turk had retired, Friend was clean bowled by Aaron Smith trying to hit another drive to the on side. Joe Clarke (18 not out) and Ed Miflord (19) continued to take advantage of any wayward bowling as the Gosport attack suffered in the sun with too many wides and short balls. Ed Milford hitting some really nice shots to the leg side in his 19 runs before he was run out just after a break in play, strangely as the pair had discussed doing nothing silly in the break!

Jack Butcher and Cameron Porteous came out to try and push the score along and supported Joe Clarke as the run rate dropped, this was partly due to the new Readers ball having split from the onslaught in the first ten overs. Both Jack and Cameron were clean bowled by Jacob Harris to leave Petersfield on a slightly below par 115 given the start they had.

After a quick break and with the sun setting Petersfield went about defending the total with real aplomb as Ben Turk (4-18 off 4) and Joe Clarke (2-19 off 2) completely blew away the Gosport openers and middle order as the first 6 wickets went down for 34 runs in 8 overs. Every wicket was clean bowled with both lads getting the ball to swing and seam causing the mayhem in the Gosport batting.

Matt Friend (1-6 off 2) and William Milner-Smith (2-4 off 2) finished off the tail as only Ieuan Harrison (15) reached double figures, deftly guiding anything wide down to 3rd man before he missed a straight one from Friend. Will picking up two wickets with his very effective medium pace left arm round the wicket with 2 wickets in the last over.

Gosport finished on 51 -9 off 10 overs having lost one of their players due to illness.

This was Captain Matt Friend’s last game as he jets off to America for a holiday missing out on the last 2 games. He goes with the thanks from the players and his coach after leading the team with great skill and leadership.

Men of the match - Ben Turk and Joe Clarke for their great all round performances

Moment of the match - Matt Friend’s 6 which was as big as anything seen this season.

Scorecard
http://petersfield.play-cricket.com/scoreboard/scorecard.asp?id=11760377