Defeat Away at Brockley

Hartest & Coldham 99 for 9

M Atkinson 36, D Hodge 20.

J Brame 10 -0-35-6

Brockley 100 for 4 

T Fenner Not Out 33,

N Rutter 2 - 37


   With Captain Roberts away the roll of skipper fell to Benjamin Atkinson who lost the toss and Hartest and Coldham were asked to bat first on a quite warm sunny day.

   Hodge opened with last week's in form batsman Dave Armstrong who between them blocked well for 6 overs without a run on the board but not losing wickets.

   It was very tough scoring runs on a decent pitch with odd one keeping a bit low but dogged resistance began to tell as the runs came if not flowing they came.

  With 14 overs bowled and the score on 26 Dave Armstrong was bowled for 12 and that brought wickets falling at regular intervals as Hodge was next to go for a bullish 20 getting caught behind and the score on 39.

   John  Ralling came in and looked in good form but J Brame was on fire and he then  dismissed Ralling for two before three wickets fell with the score on 54, one of the two new men making their debut Richard Carter a former Brockley player in the past who had not picked up a bat in a long time for 5 runs, then Jack Sasi making his debut from the local village Glebe Stores caught a corker first ball and sent back without scoring, Peter Richards survived the hatrick ball only to get caught next ball leaving the score on 57 for 6.

   Captain Ben Atkinson  was joined by Mark Atkinson but shortly after that meeting skied one and was caught out for 13 which brought out Steve Ryder but he soon fell bowled by Hill, it was looking  bleak but Jay Davenport hung around to great effect whittling a few runs one to use up the overs and try to put in a score to try and defend.

Mark Atkinson got to the last ball of the innings thinking he needed two of the last ball to get the total to a hundred, came down the wicket to miss it only to be stumped for 36.


   After tea Brockley came out and found runs also hard to come by with a slow progress all due to a great team effort and super fielding backing up the bowlers Ryder & Hodge bowling their allotted 10 overs each for the Brockley score to reach 36 for 2 both getting a wicket each.

   Brockley always just had enough in the tank and found it very tough to scratch out the runs but the wickets just didn't come quick enough to put any real pressure on the Brockley team as Tom Fenner a very good player at this level had to come in over take the opening bat to get Brockley to cross the line.

   Two wickets for Nick Rutter and good support bowling from Dave Armstrong with great fielding plus very good first outing as Captain for Ben Atkinson who could not have asked more from his troops.

   Nearly at the end of the 35th over before Brockley achieved the target which goes to show how hard it was to grind out runs but that was a lot down to good energy and fielding throughout the whole team, Jay Davenport a special mention for scoring his highest score, some very sharp fielding plus getting engaged to Emily Faires well done and good luck to you both from the Cricket team.