RAIN ‘DRAWS’ AN END TO AN ENTERTAINING FRIENDLY.

Sunday 22nd May brought a second friendly of the season for the Portcullis posse. The second fixture arranged for the weekend saw the Duthie Park Green Caps make the short journey to Peoples Park to take on a Stoneywood Dyce select side.

For Portcullis, and their bizarre excess of players this season, this would be an opportunity to give fringe players opportunities to show their talents. This match would be predominantly an exercise to experiment rather than looking for a win.

The purpose of these friendlies was to give as much of those playing a bat and a ball as possible. This is so we can bring on players, make them enjoy their cricket more and improve whilst doing it. Ideally, in turn, this would increase competition for places in the Saturday team making our overall squad stronger.

Although Portcullis do not have a second XI, we do have a squad we call the Portcullis Progressive XI. This team is captained at a more relaxed level by Ronnie Falconer.

His opposite number for the day was Rufus Gandhi. Rufus was kind enough to let Portcullis field first after Ronnie explained the purpose of the friendly. The purpose for Rufus and Stoneywood was to bring on their youngsters, many at this moment would not be ready to the step up Grades Cricket.

With rain earlier, the match was reduced to a 35 overs a side as it did not start till 2pm.

Showing his intentions early doors, Portcullis opened their bowling with club legends Bob Adie and Richard Collinson. For the Stoneywood Dyce Development XI, the batting would be opened by Stoneywood Senior Jack Lambley. Accompanying him would be youngster Chris Garrard.

It was a contrasting start for the Portcullis bowling pair. Adie, with his tidy off-spinners, bowled with his usual hypnotic accuracy and only lost 18 runs from his four overs. Collinson with his away drifters, was not so hypnotic sadly. Lambley in particular taking Collinson to task. An early off drive back past Collinson for a stupendous six, saw many a Portcullis fielder show admirable athleticism (I certainly was not one of them!) in vaulting the multi coloured wall to retrieve the ball.

This early onslaught put Stoneywood Dyce into the driving seat. Young Chris Garrard, showing sound technique, settled in as anchor of the partnership. A few glances and pushes brought ones and twos. His desire for a boundary was met when he clipped one off his legs for a lovely four through square leg from Adie.

Continuing with the theme of experimentation, Adie and Collinson were to be replaced by Owen Thorpe and Mansoor Hussein. By then Jack Lambley had made a Chris Gayle like fifty and retired to give others a chance. It was a splendid knock that included 6 fours and two sixes.

The onslaught continued though as Brayden Stepien, who came on to replace the retiring Lambley, continued where Lambley left off.

Stepien soon made an entertaining fifty himself before retiring also. His 51 included five fours and two sixes.

Young Garrard continued to bat well alongside Stepien, gathering a further three boundaries. He eventually went for an entertaining 28, Hussein bowling Garrard with a fine ball.

With the two retirals this meant that the first wicket fell with the score on 137 after 14 overs! At this point it looked as if a score of 300 was possible for Stoneywood Dyce!

With Philip’s experimental off-spin and Hussein’s accuracy producing no more wickets, it was the turn of Chris Poolman and Ross McKenzie to try their luck with the cherry. Stoneywood continued the batting policy of one senior, one junior with the fundamental exercise being the bringing on of their youngsters. Thankfully the seniors were not quite as potent as Lambley or Stepien before them. Or maybe Portcullis bowled better.

Poolman, with his variation of spin, soon captured his first wicket of the day – bowling Scott Reid with a good un. Adam Gould, perhaps a little unaware of his surroundings, found himself stumped by Vijayakrishnan to become Poolman’s second victim.

Ross McKenzie managed to capture a couple of wickets of his own. He managed to get Thomas Samuel caught at mid-on by the ever reliable Vijayakrishnan. His second wicket was perhaps the most spectacular. A McKenzie full toss was met by Matthew Brown who smashed and flat-batted towards mid-off and extra cover. The ball had enough pace on it to go arrow straight for six. Thankfully Falconer was on hand to adjust his positioning and hands to hold onto an excellent catch.

Poolman, having had his bowling spell interrupted due to a facial injury, recovered sufficiently enough to grab a third wicket. This was a second stumping, this time by Collinson, as Connor Arnold became his third victim.

The rest of Portcullis’s bowling was padded out by Ronnie Falconer, Andy Phillip and Kannan Vijayakrishnan. Of the three, only Andy Philip got a wicket. Dear reader I am ashamed to say I cannot remember how he came about it. If you think that is bad, I asked him as well (for this report) and he could not tell me either!!

In the meantime Stoneywood’s innings drew to a close. After their 35 overs Stoneywood Dyce finished with 193-7. Top scorers were Jack Lambley with 57, Brayden Stepien (51), Chris Garrard (28) and Matthew Brown with 19. Nine year old Ruben Gandhi finished on a fine 2 not out, outscoring his dad who was with him at the end. Ruben had the shot of the day when he creamed a Falconer off-spinner through mid-off for a fine single and raucous cheers from both teams!

Ronnie Falconer, in recent years has now had his bowling skelped by a nine year old and a seventy six year old (John Hitchin – Crathie) and he STILL thinks he can bowl!!

For Portcullis, Chris Poolman finished with 3-17 (with a near shameful “send-off” on the capture of his third wicket). Ross McKenzie returned figures of 2-15. The other wicket takers were Mannie Hussein (1-35) and Andy ‘mystery ball’ Phillip (1-15).

The most splendid of teas was made up and received gratefully! So splendidly that skipper of the day Ronnie Falconer promptly put himself down as batting twelve!

Once the players were fed and watered it was time for Portcullis to begin their own innings. With Chris Poolman standing down from his initial opening duties, the batting would be opened by Andy Philip and Dave Elrick. Replying for Stoneywood with the cherry would be Matthew Brown and Thomas Samuel.

There was a bit of a shock for the Portcullis posse when the Stoneywood Dyce wicketkeeper and slips were found to be an alarming distance away from the back of the stumps. They were either optimistic or Matthew Brown was seriously quick.

We were hoping for the optimistic viewpoint.

Alas the distance was justified and Brown came in at an impressive pace. Thankfully he had the control to go with it. This meant he bowled at a full length occasionally getting the ball to nip off of a length away from the right handed batsmen.

To their credit, despite never having faced bowling so quick, both Elrick and Philip batted well. They got in behind the ball and defended vigorously. At the other end young Samuel bowled accurately with little luck.

Brown was to be rewarded however as an excellent leg stump Yorker was to do for Philip. Portcullis 4-1.

Andy Philip was replaced by Mansoor Hussein. Mannie too dug in and, with Elrick, got Portcullis back into the game. The pair saw off the quicksilver Brown (thankfully) and accurate Samuel. They were replaced by the pairing of Ahklaq Bashir and Scott Reid. Bashir showed that he too was quite sharp with the leather also. Perhaps a tad slower but his control was equally impressive and he seemed to move the ball a bit more. To their credit, with the rain falling, Hussein and Elrick stuck gamely to their task. The score moved onto 28 before Elrick finally succumbed to the skill of Bashir. He too going by the way of bowled but there was no shame in being defeated by bowlers of that calibre.

The rain was getting more persistent however as next batsman Hamish Mitchell came to the crease. There was one more over that was bowled by young Ruben Gandhi. His fourth ball nearly done for Mitchell. He lured the Australian into a pull shot that just dropped short of the fielder.

With that stumps were drawn and Portcullis finished 30-2 from their 16 overs.

PORTCULLIS MAN OF THE MATCH.

We’ll give this one to Chris Poolman for his 3-17. That’s despite his almost send-off to a young Stoneywood Dyce batsman! Hamish Mitchell quite rightly ripping the preverbial out of young Poolman for his (almost) unsporting gesture!

STONEYWOOD DYCE MAN OF THE MATCH.

Brayden Stepien takes it for his Gayle like 50. He came in to replace Lambley and continued to build the momentum of the Stoneywood Dyce innings.

Monday, 06 June, 2016