2023-07-08_DJs

Match Data vs DJs on 2023-07-08 at Oxford (Season 2023)

Salix drop 6 and still prosper!

Report by Dils

406 days is a long time, we’ve had three prime ministers, a new King, Bank of England interest rates were 1% (now 5%) and Brendon McCullum had only recently been appointed England Head Coach. It’s been that many days since we could say Salix have won a game of cricket! Yes we’ve had a couple of draws in that time, but this was a win – a proper win.

Losing 4 games this season, doesn’t tell the story of how we have played this season, games have been close and have been decided by small margin in 3 of the 4 games. We knew we were close, but losing is a difficult habit to break – but an outstanding team performance on Saturday finally got us over the line.

As the team drove up the motorway, weather was looking a bit damp to say the least. Talk of a reduced over game was discussed, but thankfully both team’s skippers were brave to commit to a 35-over a game side. Skipper Raj lost the toss again this season, and Salix were put into bat onto a damp and spongy wicket. Skip & Delilah opened the batting, and unfortunately for Delilah he got a good ball early up and was bowled. This brought Raj’s cousin Munjot to the wicket, and they both started to get the scoreboard ticking along. With good running between the wicket, and putting the very rare bad ball away we had reached 58/1 by the 12th over, before Rog got Raj LBW. This brought CK1 to the wicket, and this was the start of what would be a brilliant 151 run partnership between Munjot & CK1. Batting was difficult against some really good bowling, special mention to Abdullah who bowled an excellent spell of off-spin who finished unluckily without a wicket but with figures of 7-2-18-0. But Munjot & CK1 were able to keep rotating the strike and as we reached 71/1 after 19 overs the two batsman started to really accelerate the scoring. The next 15 overs went for 130 runs, with both batsman passing excellent 50s. Heading into the last over Munjot was on 90, as he tried to reach his hundred he was bowled on the penultimate delivery for 94. However, by this point he and CK1 had built a really strong total.

The tea as per usual was phenomenal, and worth the match fee alone. However, onto the bowling effort. Syed & Raj opened the bowling and immediately had the ball swinging which brought tough chances in the slips which both went down (a theme for the day). Rog opening the batting for DJs had reached 30 before first change bowler Fergus was able to entice a miss timed lofted drive which Deepak was able to snaffle. Not to be outdone by his son, Simon from the other end got the other opening batsman caught behind. Whilst wickets were falling regularly, runs continued to flow as both the pitch and outfield continued to dry and make batting easier than the first innings. As rain threatened, DJs started tracking the Duckworth-Lewis score – and suggested it was close but that the DJs were ahead by circa 5-10 runs. We needed wickets, so Raj brought back Syed who delivered 2 wickets in 2 balls in the 29th over and the game was back in the balance. DJs continued to bat well, especially Bach who batted brilliantly, a few more drop catches not helping the Salix cause – however in the 34th over, Krutik got him with Deepak taking a good reflex catch. Heading into the last over, DJs needed 18, but brilliant death bowling from Fergus restricted them to only 4.

A win, and whilst some great individual performances – Munjot & CK1 with the bat, Syed, Fergus with the ball & Ben with the gloves, it was a great team performance – everyone contributed either with the bat, ball or in the field. Yes a few catches went down, but the ground fielding was good and in the end it came down to those small margins. Now onto the Whalers and try and make it two in a row!

A quick thanks to the support crew of  Tim, Poppy (Salix official mascot?), Nadisha and Pooja – it makes the day even better having you. Some pictures & videos from the day are on the Salix Instagram page – please watch & share to increase our presence & potentially help recruit players for the future.