Western Telegraph Match Report, 7th June 2006.
Neyland Match Report
Neyland vs StIshmaels. League fixture, Saturday 3rd June 2006. Umpires: David Loosemore & Tony Waldeis .Neyland's stand in tosser Gregg Miller did what he was there to do, and invited StIshmaels to bat. Neyland were on a pretty bad run, having won the first game of the season against newly promoted Pembroke, but then losing the next 4 league fixtures, prior to this game. Neyland opened the bowling with Andrew Phillips and Henry Durrant, against Tish openers Andrew Palmer and Jonathan Pawlett. The bowlers began well, bowling a fairly tight line and not giving much away. However in the 4th over Pawlett went on the attack against Durrant. He struck a four through straight extra cover, and another over long on, taking 10 off the over. A couple of field changes were made, dropping long off, long on, and cover, and in Durrant's next over Pawlet drove a full toss to A Miller at straight extra cover.
Peter Bradshaw joined Palmer at the crease and the runs began to dry up. Durrant conceded only one run off his next four overs, finishing his spell with 1 for 12 off 6 overs, and Phillips continued to test the batsmen and bowl very few lose deliveries. After 6 overs Phillips had conceded only eight runs and the StIshmaels score stood at only 20 for 1 off 12 overs.
Phil Davies took over from Durrant at the club house end and began an even more miserly spell than Durrant's. Davies' removed the Tish skipper Bradshaw, adjudged lbw sweeping, with his second ball, and his first three overs were all maidens. At the other end Gregg Miller replaced Phillips and he too bowled a good line and length. When Miller struck in his sixth over, removing Palmer caught by Murray for 19, Tish were 36 for 3 in the 23rd over.
The young left handed Phil Cockburn joined the experienced Andrew Williams but the Neyland bowlers maintained a tight rein on the Tish scoring. Andrew Williams began to play a few nice cover drives off Miller but Davies continued to concede very little such that when Gregg ended his nine over spell, finishing with one for 26, Tish had still only accumulated 56 runs off 29 overs.
Gary Lloyd replaced Miller in the attack and Davies struck again in the following over, removing Cockburn caught behind by Sean Hannon. Davies completed his 12 over spell with impressive figures of 12-4-16-2, and Lloyd switched ends to allow Phillips to return for a second spell, and Tish finally made an attempt to increase the scoring rate. Williams had been at the crease for some time now and was beginning to find the middle of the bat, and new batsman, the Sri Lankan M Mohammed was always looking for any quick runs, though some of the calls he made could only be described as suicidal. Fortunatley for Tish Williams made sure that he dominated the calling, sending Mohammed back on several occasions.
After 35 overs Tish were 72 for 4, and after 40 they had reached 96 for 4. In the 43rd over Phillips bowled a wicket maiden, with Mohammed caught by A Miller for 16, and in the 44th over Lloyd had Williams caught by Murray for 53, completing his 6 overs with 1 for 29.
On the final ball of the innings Tish stood at 119 for 5, with Rob Thomas and A Pawlett at the crease. The two batsmen convened and it appeared the batsmen had agreed to run almost anything in pursuit of the fourth batting point. Conversely one more wicket for Neyland would bring the third bowling bonus point. The Neyland close fielders were brought in even tighter and Pawlett duly hit the final Phillips delivery to mid off and set off for the run. Gregg Miller swooped at mid off and completed the run out with an underarm direct hit from close range, giving Neyland the ideal finish to what had been a very good bowling display. StIshmaels had finished on 119 for 6, and Neyland went to tea feeling confident that they had a very good chance to reverse the two defeats they had suffered at the hand of Tish the previous year.