Crow Road v Marress, 02/06/2007

Crow Road v Marress
WDCU Div 5, Old Anniesland, 02/06/2007

Marress won toss and elected to field

Crow Road
G Smillie lbw b Mudunuri 18
* A Rixon b M Ingram 16
# M Hussain run out 1
B Hussain b Mudunuri 7
H Livingston b Mudunuri 0
I Thomson not out 18
J McGrath b Mudunuri 5
S Alcock c Bennett b Reuben 13
G Reid b Mudunuri 0
Z Iqbal lbw b Mudunuri 0
D Tate b Mudunuri 3
Extras 30
Total (all out, 41.2 ovs) 111

M Ingram 9-3-23-1, Conway 6-2-17-0, Mudunuri 14.2-4-21-7,
D Ingram 7-1-22-0, Reuben 5-1-19-1

Marress
* M Ingram lbw b B Hussain 57
# Bennett b Reid 0
Mudunuri lbw b Reid 29
D Ingram not out 10
Conway not out 5
Extras 13
Total (3 wkts, 21.3 ovs) 114
Gillaland, Park, Sachin, Ram, Cooney and Reuben did not bat

McGrath 4-0-36-0, Reid 10.3-2-45-2, Iqbal 6-1-32-0,
B Hussain 1-0-1-1

Marress won by 7 wickets
Crow Road 3 pts, Marress 25 pts

Match Report

Old Anniesland was not a good place to be on Saturday if you were a GHK player. The 2nd XI took a heavy beating from Clydesdale while over on the magic carpet Crow Road put in a limp display to slump to defeat against Marress (Irvine 2s). After Rixon lost a toss he’d really have preferred to win, Crow Road were put in to bat under cloudy skies with their intended opening batsmen both still engaged in a school match. It was therefore Smillie and Rixon who strode out to face the bowling, hoping for a repeat of their Home Park partnership against an attack that conceded 136 to Yoda’s bat alone last year.

The bowlers gave nothing away early on though, bowling a controlled line outside off stump to start with three consecutive maidens. Rixon then managed to hit a few bad balls to the boundary but, in the 11th over, missed a drive at a straight one to be dismissed for 16. This brought Mobeen to the crease and hopes were high that his free-hitting style could put the bowling off its rhythm. Instead, it all ended in tears as he set off for a single and had almost reached the far end of the pitch by the time Smillie sent him back to be run out.

The Crow Road batting order was now in some disarray as the school match was still in progress and young GHK debutant Hamish Livingston (who was quite literally plucked from the school car park shortly before the match after a player was lost to the 2s) was only available for another hour. In the end, it was Blaal who got the nod to go in at No. 4 with Hamish to follow, and they were soon batting together after Smillie was trapped lbw to end an innings that never really got out the blocks.

By now, Marress had unleashed their secret weapon, the spinner Mudunuri who apparently played for GHK as recently as last season. Bowling at a skiddy pace and, as one batsman said, ‘getting the ball to do a bit of everything’, Crow Road were soon wishing he hadn’t changed clubs as he bowled Blaal, Hamish and Jimmy McGrath in quick succession. With the score on a precarious 71-5 in the 26th over, this finally brought the intended opening pair, Steve-o and Ian “Thommo/Stroppy” Thomson, together at the crease.

They duly built the highest partnership of the innings (27), which included a glorious cover drive for 4 by Steve-o but also a shocking drop by the point fielder to reprieve Thommo. The score had moved on to 98 and the run rate was starting to pick up when Steve-o nicked one to the keeper and walked off for an unlucky 13. The lower order batsmen then had no answer to Mudunuri, who swept aside Gordi Reid, Zishaan and Duncan to finish with superb figures of 7-21, although Duncan at least showed some resistance to help take the score past 100.

On the whole, the Marress bowling was tidy and the enforced changes to the Crow Road batting order made it harder to build the innings across 50 overs (by the end Thommo was looking comfortable at the crease and you have to wonder how things would have gone had he been available to open). However, a total of 111 was significantly below par and clearly Crow Road had to be disciplined from the outset to have any chance of the win.

It all started promisingly, with a good over from Jimmy, then a superb wicket maiden from Gordi in his first over for 10 months. Unfortunately the next over disappeared for 18 and from that point on, Marress were able to race along at more than a run a ball. To stand any chance of victory, Crow Road needed all the luck to go their way, but it certainly did not. Jimmy conceded a number of his runs to edges through 3rd man, a sharp chance was missed at slip and, most frustratingly of all, Gordi appeared to have both their key batsmen (M Ingram and Mudunuri) lbw early in their innings only for the Marress umpires to adjudge them not out.

When Gordi took some pace off the ball and finally did win an lbw shout (ironically to a ball that might have missed the stumps), Crow Road had a glimmer of a chance at 61-2. Zishaan kept the pressure up with some accurate medium pace but, with no sign of the rain that had been forecast, Marress were able to ease their pace and make certain of the win. They were within 3 runs of victory when Blaal came on and immediately showed some of the control that had been missing at the start to dismiss M Ingram lbw for a hard-fought 57. Good as Blaal is though, he wasn’t able to do a Malinga and it wasn’t long until Marress reached their target for no further loss.
After last week’s excellent team performance, this loss is a serious reality check. The disappointing batting display highlighted the importance of working in partnerships, although with a jumbled-up order against a useful attack, it can in part be written off as a bad day at the office. The bowling, on the other hand, needs some serious thought. On a dead pitch like the astroturf, any pace on the ball will work in favour of the batsman as soon as it’s in a hitting zone. Our quicker bowlers therefore can’t afford to bowl any short or wide ones if we want to build sustained pressure, which could well be the key to victory when we welcome the unbeaten Scotindians to Anniesland this Saturday.