Sopwith Camels – smashing…

Smashing. That’s what it was.

Smashing that we actually played. Smashing that it was in sunshine (though with a typical East Brighton park wind it was still chilly).

And smashing was what Ben did all day. Smashing the Sopwith bowlers all over the place, and smashing Beamers’ records too (probably including the number of jugs it’s possible to be liable for in one game).

We lost the toss and were asked to bat (Ha! We didn’t know what was coming so they must have been fairly surprised). John and Ben opened well ‘til John got a straight swingy one. Maf joined ‘the mighty one’ and played beautifully, scoring quickly against good bowling on a pitch where you needed skill and welly to get it off the square. Thirty and then new bowler, watch it first, ah…

David joined ‘the mighty one’ and that’s when the Beamers enjoyed a batting master class. Classic cover drives, punches through point, straight sixes merely caressed over the boundary and bloody HUGE sixes carted everywhere.

Ben scored 156! The new Beamers highest individual score. David got a bit of a shooter, Riggers and Frank didn’t have much time to trouble the scorebook and we DECLARED BEFORE TEA (well with about three minutes to spare) on 221 for 5 or some such.

A splendid tea from local caterers Eaton & Riches and the Beamers were like coiled springs ready to unleash the skipper’s cunning plan (get 10 wickets).

Well of course we didn’t – where have you been for the last 25 years?

Siddo and Riggers opened, both bowling well and chances went down a little too regularly. But not many runs, so time to bring on the left-hand duo. Gordon started fizzing them down (which is where many of them stayed much to his embarrassment) but it says bowled in the scorebook so who cares? And A&E bamboozled like only he knows how.

But the Camels weren’t moving anywhere fast. Rigby F and Nicholls tried to winkle them out, which brought more drops and few runs but a draw was the only result likely. Still, unbeaten in May looks good from here…

Rob Nic

Fixture List – Final (until it changes…)

 

	Opposition	H/A	Location	Start Time	Skipper
22-Apr	Warnham	A	Warnham	2pm	RS
29-Apr	Rottingdean	A	Rottingdean	2pm	DA
06-May	TBA – Bank Holiday	TBC	TBC	TBC
13-May	Sopwith Camels	H	East Brighton	2pm	RN
20-May	Tangmere	A	Tangmere	2pm	BR
27-May	Findon	A	Findon	2pm	AE
03-Jun	TBA – Bank Holiday	TBC	TBC	TBC
10-Jun	St Peters	A	Preston Park	1:30pm	RT
17-Jun	Crawley Down	A	Crawley Down	2pm	BR
24-Jun	Preston Park	H	Patcham Place	2pm	RS
01-Jul	Palmers	A	Hove Rec	2pm	BR
08-Jul	Lewes St Michaels	A	Convent Field	2pm	FR
15-Jul	Ditchling	A	Ditchling	2pm	NCh
22-Jul	B&H	A	Neville Ground	2pm	NCl
27-Jul	Elham Valley – Kent	A	Kent Tour	2.30pm
28-Jul	Little Chart – Kent	A	Kent Tour	1.30pm
29-Jul	Sibdon Park – Kent	A	Kent Tour	1pm
05-Aug	Seaford Seagulls	A	Newlands	2pm	RR
12-Aug	TBA	TBC	TBC	TBC
19-Aug	TBA	TBC	TBC	TBC
26-Aug	TBA – Bank Holiday	TBC	TBC	TBC
02-Sep	Hove Unicorns	H – no tea	Patcham Place	1:30pm	AE
09-Sep	Watersfield	A	Watersfield	2pm	FR
16-Sep	Lingfield	A	Newchapel	1pm	AE
23-Sep	Angmering	A	Angmering	1.30pm	RN
30-Sep	T&WCC	A	Twineham	1pm	JC

Future Events of a Netting Variety – An Old (But Not That Old) Cricketer Writes…

Beamers

The time has come to prepare yourselves for the rigours of ‘training’ as the long missed but never forgotten Aussie Greg rather euphemistically (or should that be “optimistically”? Ed) called our nets.

And just to make it easy for you it’s all as usual – Brighton College, Thursdays evenings, 6.15pm to 8.15pm.

We start on 12 April and run right through until 26 July.

In case you need reminding what this sort of thing entails I attach a photo from the archives – snapped sometime in the early sixties in Middlesbrough.

See you there

Rob x