'Strong Graveney held to a draw as Chelsfield shut-up shop

By Paul Jeffels

Graveney 246 - 7 (from 39 overs)

Chelsfield 155 - 4

Match Drawn

After missing the previous week, captain Fanning was back at the helm & was leading the way in the pre-match drinking. Himself & Bunn were seeing off the beers in fact they ordered their last pint at 1.50pm - true dedication to mood development. Having lost the toss - Graveney were inserted & the skipper had a tough job of picking the batting order with the talent available this week. 

After a couple of good knocks recently dancing bear assumed he would be batting in the top 4 & promptly started to pad-up & down a can of red bull in preparation - however the skipper had other ideas & bear was to come in at number 5. This was unfamiliar territory for bear who spent the next 2 hours itching to get into the action.

Fanning & Davies opened the innings against a moderate Chelsfield bowling attack. The pitch definitely had a bit in it for the bowlers with a bit of bounce from Wakeman bowling down the hill. Fanning fell first for 10 hitting a skier which was brilliantly taken over his shoulder by wakeman in the deep.

This brought Hussey to the wicket & immediately brought about the introduction of Milo with his loopy leg spin from the bottom end. The little fella started off quite nicely giving the balls some real air resulting in some watchful defense from Rob & Richard. Unfortunately for Milo this was not to last & a couple of big sixes from Hussey seemed to put him on the back foot; Rob was also joining in with some well struck boundaries. Just when Hussey looked to be heading towards a huge score, he played all around a straight one from Milo and he was gone.  

Nick Goodburn took on the challenge hitting Milo to all parts of the ground. Nick was going well until he too was caught expertly on the boundary by Wakeman who looked like he had spent the week at the dancing bear fielding academy. DB himself was next to the crease & was eager to keep things moving hitting 2 fours in the first 4 balls he faced. By this time Chelsfield were slower & slower in the field – in fact after 2 hours they had only bowled 30 overs. Dancing bear pointed this out to the fielding team & needless to say it didn’t go down well. 

Rob went next for 76, quickly followed by Jez & Chairman. DB was cashing in and ended up hitting the last over for 14 runs and ending 51 not out. Graveney finished on a very competitive 246-7.

A little short on bowling this week & the skipper was had to turn to dancing bear to open the bowling down the hill alongside bunny. Chelsfield started very slowly & didn’t really look like they were interested in chasing the target at any point.  

Their chase wasn’t helped when in the 4th over the openers attempted a quick single to DB who was down at fine leg. The batter had little chance to make his ground as DB hit the wickets with a super quick pickup & release.

Graveney continued to plug away with some decent bowling but Chelsfield had given up chasing the runs - this really wasn’t a good advert for timed cricket.

The only other high points were a very sharp catch from bear low to his left off the bowling of Bunn & a cameo return to the action for Ali Newman who bowled good lines down the hill.

All in all Graveney were by far the stronger team, with such a strong batting line-up it maybe worth considering batting second in future (if we win the toss)

Man of the match:  Paul Jeffels for 50 quick runs, a great run out & sharp catch, .