Charterhouse v Sunshine Coast GS
Charterhouse Coast to Victory in the Sunshine
Charterhouse 356-4 (50 overs)
Sunshine Coast GS 126 Charterhouse won by 230 runs
Wednesday 24th June was the sunniest day of the year at Charterhouse and the visitors from the Sunshine Coast must have felt very much at home in the beautiful sunshine despite the healthy breeze from the east.
The Australians were a young side playing their first match on a tour which will take them from Dover to Edinburgh. They had only got off the plane on the previous Sunday and had spent a couple of days touring Wimbledon and London and had had no time in their itinerary for cricket or even fro getting over the jet-lag. They came up against a Charterhouse team desperate to put a disappointing performance at Whitgift behind them and recover their winning ways.
So the odds were stacked against the tourists from the start and, when Charterhouse won the toss and chose to bat, things looked ominous. Australians are famous for their resilience in the face of adversity, however, and at 24-2 off just five overs it was the home team which looked like it might end up with egg on its face. At this point Alastair Gloak was joined by his captain, Jamie Rumball, and over the course of the next 25 overs the two steadily took the game away from their opponents. Both batted with control, power and great good sense. Few risks were taken as they took the score to 205. By this time Gloak had completed his maiden hundred and Rumball was set to emulate him when he mis-timed a drive off Hill and was caught at mid off for an excellent 84.
Gloak fell soon after lunch for 104, but this just brought together Ben Jeffery and Tom Kimmins who were determined to take full advantage of the remaining 17 overs. This they did in a chanceless display of aggression which brought them both fifties and left the Australians facing the daunting task of scoring 357 in 50 overs to win.
They began smartly enough with McBurney striking three fours in the first over and, though they dropped steadily behind the demanding asking rate after that, the Australians seemed little troubled as they took the score to 75-3 at tea and then on to 116-3 after 29 overs. What followed was a collapse of English dimensions. Ben Rinck snaffled three wickets in an over, Gloak came to the party too and the last seven wickets fell for just ten runs, five of which came from a penalty accrued when the ball hit the helmet parked strategically behind wicket-keeper, Tom Kimmins.
It had promised to be a one-sided battle and ultimately so it proved but both sides had much to take from it: the Australians had all had a ‘loosener’, had got into the tour and in the thirteen year-old Pinkstone had found a gem of a player. Charterhouse meanwhile had paid their opponents the respect of trying to play properly and had discovered as a result a way of moving the scoreboard round which was better than any of the anxious slogging which they have tried previously this season. In all it had been a good day’s cricket played in the right spirit by both sides and the friendliness between the teams was even more apparent in the game of touch rugby contested between them afterwards.
Sunshine Coast will have better days on the field on their tour and Charterhouse will gain great confidence from their performance and must reflect on the virtue of batting sensibly and correctly.
Charterhouse Sunshine Coast
Gloak ct and b Nicholas 104 McBurney ct C Kimmins b Bray 32
Gammell lbw b Blevin 1 Hill ct T Kimmins b Bray 4
de Soysa ct Dobson b Stone 7 Pinkstone b Rinck 44
Rumball ct Sowden b Hill 84 Sowden b Hamilton 8
Jeffery not out 79 McKnight not out 26
T Kimmins not out 58 Dobson b Rinck 0
Stone b Rinck 0
Nicholas lbw b Gloak 0
Blevin st T Kimmins b Rinck 0
Ward lbw b Gloak 0
Jones b Gloak 0
Extras (nb 3, w 7, lb 4, b 9) 23 Extras (nb 5, w 1, lb 1, p 5) 12
TOTAL (4 wkts) 356 TOTAL 126
Stone 12-0-73-1 Blevin 10-0-67-1 Kinsey 4-0-29-0 Bray 6-2-15-2
Sowden 9-0-64-0 Jones 6-0-38-0 Hamilton 8-0-38-1 C Kimmins 5-0-7-0
McBurney 2-0-22-0 Nicholas 4-0-25-1 Rinck 5-2-14-4 Gloak 4.5-0-17-3
Hill 5-0-39-1 Morris 2-0-15-0
Bob Noble