Wilcot, Sunday 4th July 2021

Listening to all the talk this weekend around the village of a very important sporting fixture this weekend, its my pleasure to bring you the match report from that sporting fixture Inkpen vs Wilcot. Now before I bring you the action from our game against our old friends, last time you were reading a match report, we had just completed a fine victory to extend our run to 2 games unbeaten, well we have played another (very wet) game since then which was a 20/20 against Hungerford. Now apparently according to Dave “milking the sore toe still” Glitz 20/20’s don’t count, well thanks to Dave “no more ducks this season” Lester hitting 50 not out and a fantastic bowling display (ok ok so they batted in the dark and rain), Inkpen managed to win another making it 3 in a row… Yes readers 3 in a row… Unbelievable Jeff. Now according to the “Older” players and we have a few, this feat has never been achieved in the modern era, so well done everyone its great to see us on the up. Now back to Sunday could we make 4 in a row, well if we could forget “it’s coming home” I think Simon “ooh new rollers on my lawn mower” Hanna will be heard singing as he mows “another one bites the dust”.

For the first time this year the toss was conducted using an actual coin and it didn’t go the way of Inkpen as they were put into the field. So it was up to our now settled opening pair of James ‘can I just be number 2 for one week please’ Hall and Ean ‘can I keep the duck hat please’ Dixon to get Inkpen going. Wilcot were 94-3 off 20 and the Wilcot big guns arrived, smashing it around. Michael Margetts took a wonderful catch to remove the danger man before two additional wickets fell, leaving Wilcot at 156-6 off their 30 overs.

However with the score 85 off 13 Dave “Dave Lamb, your pads are obv magical 2 x 50’s since you gave them to me” Lester holed out to the deep ending up on 60 and Phil “I’ve hit one run that’s enough” Day was bowled for 1. After reaching 110-4 off 20 overs, Inkpen lost momentum and the famous Inkpen collapse returned. John Donohoe was bowled for 16, then subsequent batters fell quickly. Inkpen finished all out for 124 off 27.2 overs, 32 runs short.

Although we couldn’t stretch our unbeaten record to 4 games, it’s all about friends and strangers coming together to enjoy an afternoon in the sun… ok in the showers. We are at home to Boxford on the 11th and hopefully the next time I write one of these classics ‘It has come home.’