Historical day as 1st EAPL win is recorded!
July 25 2020 will go down in the history of Sawston and Babraham CC as the day they, finally, made the first appearance in the EAPL. It will also be remembered as the day of their first ever victory in the competition.
SBCC travelled to local rivals Saffron Walden on the back of three friendly defeats including perhaps the most disappointing performance in their defeat at the Anglo-American Sports Field some two weeks earlier. Dan Heath won the toss and elected to field no doubt influenced by the indifferent weather forecast. Sawston were pleased to be able to field their strongest line up with Mark Smith joining James Vandepeer and Tim Moses in giving the skipper some quality new ball options.
The home side opened up with youngsters Harry Gallian and Cambridgeshire’s Nikhil Gorantla, who had eased Walden to that victory 14 days ago. This time Vandepeer removed Gallian, in his first over, and the second of the innings and then Moses ousted Gorantla to leave Walden 10 for 2. The home side had recovered to 45 for 2 as Jack Sneath (19) and ex-SBCC keeper Ali Russell (22) rebuilt the innings. However, the introduction of SBCC’s 2019 Bowler of the Year, Smith, brought an almost instant reward as Sneath succumbed to a rash stroke to Smith’s second delivery. Finn Karsten followed to the third ball of the next over, in almost identical fashion to Sneath, as Walden wobbled again to 46 for 4. Skipper Heath justifying his decision to introduce the spin of Callum Guest, despite the early movement for the seamers from the new pink ball, as he also picked up a wicket in his first over. Russell followed in the sixteenth over stumped by Heath off Guest having survived a very close call for another stumping two balls earlier. With Walden 69 for 5 Alex Sears (44 off 39 balls), with some tremendous ball striking including four massive sixes, badly needed someone to stay with him. Ex-SBCC Junior Andy Laws hung around and even survived the curse of the new bowler’s first over before George Darlow, in his second over, removed Laws at 99 for 6. Darlow struck again when he had Sears caught at slip as Walden slipped to 112 for 7. Moses returned to remove the dangerous home Skipper Ben Harris before Deamer and Ormsby added a stubborn twenty runs. Spin twins Guest (3-20) and Darlow (3-23) returned to close out the Walden innings on 145. A disappointing total on one of the best tracks around. Moses (2-41), Smith (1-23) Vandepeer (1-35) backed up the spinners in a well balanced SBCC attack that still had Clilverd, Stafford, Hussain and Cafferkey in reserve.
In reply a tremendous opening spell from the impressive Ali Hancock (2-15) had the visitors in early trouble at 21-2 before Charlie Lewis (21 not out) and Callum Guest (24 not out) had steered them to 58 for 2. At this point the light rain scheduled for the remainder of the afternoon arrived all in one go and any hopes of a resumption of play were soon extinguished. Fortunately for SBCC the point where DLS kicked in had been reached and they were able to claim the victory and 25 points.
Paul Tibble
