Old Carthusians 203 - 7 dec & 176-9 dec (Corridan 5-62)
Charterhouse 181-8 (Ryder-Smith 74) & (Kimmins 64)
Charterhouse won by 2 wickets
As part of Charterhouse’s Quatercentenary celebrations the annual match between the School and the Old Boys reverted to the two-day format of yesteryear and produced one of the most exciting climaxes for many years.
There was little sign of things to come on Friday 24th June as the Old Boys crawled to just 33-0 off the first twenty overs. The School bowled 42 overs before lunch but the Old Boys still only managed 102-1 in that time. Things improved only a little after the break and when the declaration finally came at 203-7 almost 74 overs had been bowled and it was almost time for tea. In reply James Wood showed his customary resilience but Oli Plummer and Tom Gallyer both fell cheaply and, when Wood was out three short of yet another half century, the School stood at 85-3 and seemed to be well on course for catch the visitors’ score early the next day.
Sadly, four overs from the close the School slumped from 118-3 to 120-6 and were left to wonder how they could extricate themselves the following day. The answer was Jack Ryder-Smith who batted with great control and, helped by Rob Carnegie-Brown, he took the score rapidly to 171before being bowled by Dan Bowman for 74. Shortly afterwards the School declared 22 shy of their target and gave the Old Boys just over an hour to bat before lunch.
Again Charterhouse’s openers bowled with great menace but their only success came when Gallyer trapped Rozier-Pamplin leg before.
When they had finished the School turned to its left-arm spinners. This time the ever-reliable Andy Corridan was rewarded for his efforts. In the first innings he had bowled 23 tight overs without success.
On Saturday afternoon he reeled off 16 overs unchanged and picked up five wickets for his trouble. None of the Old Carthusians managed to get on top of the bowling for any length of time and they lost nine wickets before declaring 35 minutes before tea. Now the game was really on, but not for long, as the School were three down for just 22 runs ten overs later. The target of 199 looked a long way off asRyder-Smith and Gonszor tried to get their team back on course. Gonszor fell for just a dozen when the score was 47 but this only served to bring Charlie Kimmins to the crease. Kimmins has made a mockery of seemingly reasonable targets several times already this season and here he set about the task again. On a pitch where every other batsman had found runs hard to come by, he reached fifty off just 34 balls and with the assistance first of Ryder-Smith and then Tom Gordon-Martin he began to wrest the game away from the opposition. Just when it was beginning to look like plain sailing, however Bowman found a little extra pace and removed Kimmins’ off stump.
At 153-6 the game was very much in the balance but Carnegie-Brown continued his recent excellent form and, taking the attack to the opposition, he and Gordon-Martin eased their way to the brink of victory. In a final flurry of panic, Gordon-Martin was caught leg before for the second time in the match, Chris Drakeford-Lewis was run out going for a third run and the nerves were really beginning to jangle when Marwan Mohammad turned the ball round the corner for two runs to bring the scores level. Then in a comic anti-climax, Tom Kimmins bowled a no ball to hand victory to the School with just three overs remaining.
The match had been played in an excellent spirit as one would expect and saw some excellent performances on both sides though it was the reliability of Jack Ryder-Smith, who scored 118 runs over the two innings, and the dash of Charlie Kimmins which most caught the eye.