CUTHBERT LEADS VICTORY CHARGE
Wooburn Narkovians 2nd XI kept up the pressure at the top of Thames Valley League Division 3 with a memorable victory over Newbury on Saturday. Set a huge target of 268, Wooburn executed the perfect run chase to win with eight balls to spare. A superb 92 not out from Alan Cuthbert anchored Wooburn\s effort, but all the batsmen made a contribution, particularly skipper Rob Smith (66) and Nigel Purchase (25).
When things got under way, Wooburn drew first blood when seamer Kevin Czakan removed Bartlett with the fourth ball of the day. Czakan was the pick of the bowlers, well supported by John Saunders, the young Dave Small and Rob Rogers. For Newbury, Herdman (46) and Bartlett snr. (41) played well, but surprisingly, in a total of 267-9, no batsman passed 50. There was an excellent performance from extras however, who amassed a staggering 62.
With stalwart opener Dave Rogers missing, Richard Barker went in first with Rob Smith. Both openers looked solid against a hostile opening spell from Chris Bartlett, who managed to hit the ridge a number of times with the new ball. The score had reached 29 when Barker was caught behind hooking, bringing Paul Cuthbert to the crease. Cuthbert has been in fine form of late, but was strangely subdued early on. When he finally got off the mark, he hit six boundaries in quick succession, before he inexplicably missed a straight full toss from Digweed.
Alan Cuthbert, returning after a three week absence, replaced his brother, and now the chase began in earnest. Smith and Cuthbert assumed total control, Cuthbert reaching fifty first, followed next ball by Smith. Bartlett came back to make the breakthrough, when Smith attempted to hook a ball the bounced to high and only succeeded in lobbing a catch back to the bowler. There was a danger now that the scoring rate would drop, but new man Nigel Purchase continued where Smith left off, striking the ball superbly from the start.
Bartlett now resorted to persistent short-pitched bowling with men set deep for the hook shot, but this was food and drink to the Wooburn batsmen and the runs continued to flow. Only seven were needed when Purchase departed for an invaluable 25, but by then the work had been done. Cuthbert scored the winning runs with eight balls to spare, to finish on 92, enabling a jubilant Wooburn team to celebrate a famous victory.
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