Broadstairs travelled to Nonington, a ground where we’ve struggled to get results in the past, but to stay in the hunt for promotion we had to win.
On a scorching hot day, returning skipper Matt Hardy won the toss and elected to bat. Jay & Nathan opened-up and Jay got us off to a flyer, 15 coming from the first over including three boundaries and another 12 in boundaries coming from the third over; we’d raced to 29 from 3 overs.
Nathan (1) was dismissed in the fifth, caught behind and Alex joined Jay.
The two batsmen settled in, after the quick start the Nonington bowlers had settled in to a better line and length and Jason Cork was unfortunate not to pick up a couple of wickets.
After 10 overs we had moved to 46 and at the first drinks break we were nicely set at 70. The spinners were then brought into the game, left arm off spin from one end and leg spin from the overseas South African at the other.
Jay who had earlier in the innings surpassed 400 league runs, then brought up his half-century and look set to get a big one.
Alex was supporting well and at the half-way stage we were 106-1.
Jay then fell for a classy 67, a full toss from the leg spinner caught at mid-on and in his next over Bailey (0) played on. Alex (50) then brought up his fifth half century of the season before being adjudged LBW and a quick-fire 11 from George before he was bowled meant we had slipped to 143-5 with 12 overs remaining.
Matt Hardy and Tom Marshall had a tricky job in stabilising but also getting runs on the board. The pair decided to take a lot of quick singles, rotating the strike and frustrating the fielding side. In the 10 overs they were together, the pair built a partnership of 68 before Tom (26) was caught, Hardy then picked up his second half-century of the season before being excellently caught at mid-wicket. Chris Flint (11*) finished the innings with a boundary after Chris Kidd had been run out and we had totalled 232.
Definitely a winning total, or so we thought…
Ellison and Flint shared the new ball and despite a couple of chances from Flint that didn’t quite go to hand we didn’t look like troubling the bowlers. After 10 overs the home side were 34-0. By the time we got to drinks, Kidd jnr & snr were on but George struggled to find his rhythm. The overseas then hit Chris for a big straight 6 and we knew we had a game on our hands.
Chris then struck in his fourth over, bowling Di Cicco to claim his 30th wicket of the season and in his next over West was LBW.
Amongst this, the home side’s overseas player had brought up his 50 and was hitting the ball very cleanly. From 84-2 we then lost our way, we weren’t able to find a way to stop Van Dyk and he was taking the game away from us! Jay (8-0-34-0) had bowled well without success, Nathan struggled to find his line but then George came back and managed to bowl Smith. 148-3 with a well set overseas. We needed to get him out if we had any chance of getting a result.
Van Dyk reached an excellent century and was taking the game away from us. Hardy needed someone to step up and who else would you turn to but Chris Kidd (10-2-27-3), in his first over back he took a return catch to claim his third wicket and we’d seen the back of the overseas for a superb 109.
With ten overs remaining, 48 runs were required and 6 wickets in hand. Brad then replaced Flinty, a full toss on leg stump brought up a boundary but the ball had started to reverse and Paton was bowled a couple of deliveries later. In his next over he bowled Ward and at the other end George managed to remove the dangerous Jamie Burrett, caught by Jay at deep mid-off and Nonington were 213-7 from 46.
20 runs were required from 4 overs but now only 3 wickets remained. You could feel the tension all around the ground. The ball was still reversing and Brad (10-2-29-4) then had Coulson LBW and four balls later Cork played on, somehow we were one wicket away from victory.
A superb 48th over from George (9-0-54-2) yielded only 1 single meaning 17 were required from the final 12 deliveries.
Chris Flint (9.4-1-54-0) replaced Brad and was unfortunate not to get a run out when the stumps were so stuck into the ground he couldn’t remove them. But when Goldbacher hit out to long on, George gathered the ball and threw superbly into Flint when the batsmen were trying to take two, Flinty was able to gather and take the bails off meaning we had won by 12 runs.
An excellent game that we could well have lost and most probably would have lost last season. Special mention for Bailey’s keeping, stopping some wayward leg side deliveries that could easily have gone for 4.
We welcome Harvel at Park Avenue this week, come down, give us some support, enjoy a few drinks and for those who can’t make it we should have the live stream running.
Broadstairs won by 12 runs
Broadstairs won the toss and elected to bat
232-8 (50 overs)
Jay Basu 67, Matt Hardy 51, Alex Hogben 50, Tom Marshall 26
Nonington 220 all out (48.4 overs)
Bradley Ellison 4-24 including 4-12 in final three overs of spell.
Chris Kidd 3-27
George Kidd 2-54