Wooburn welcomed Bagshot CC to Nark Park on a splendid summers day, now customary for the summer of 2018.
In very uncustomary fashion, Wooburn Skipper M.A.Tennant actually managed to lose the toss, and with the team whispers that he might be looking to bowl, had the opportunity taken away from him as Bagshot elected to do just that.
Tennant raced back into the dressing room to get padded up and took to the crease with P.Cooper. Both made a solid start, Cooper getting into his textbook stride with easy on the eye strokes, Tennant almost scoring exclusively with singles and fours.
The opening pair sauntered to 39 when Cooper was caught and Barker soon followed. This set the scene for Bushnell, seeing a slight promotion in the batting order, to stride out in confident fashion. He wasted no time in getting on with the task in hand and with Tennant also in full flow, the innings gained momentum.
The partnership cruised through the 100 mark as Wooburn begun to enjoy a long and fruitful partnership, a strange experience in what is proving a tough season.
Both batsmen traded blows with the Bagshot bowlers in equal fashion, with the partnership broken by Tennant being caught with the Wooburn score on 190/3.
One would assume, if at this point it was mentioned the final innings score was 216, that a ridiculous typo may have been made, or that a sick joke was being played. But I assure you dear reader this is no mistake or joke. The 7 remaining Wooburn wickets were taken for 26 runs, 18 of which were attributed to Mick Farnon. It would be unfair to name names, but as I write, Wooburn historians are frantically working through the archives to see if there have ever been more than 3 golden ducks in a Wooburn 1st XI innings. It should be noted that the main foe of the Wooburn Batsmen was a J.Sutherland, with enviable figures of 6/65 from 12, no doubt doing the average no harm at all.
Tea was duly provided by club legends and life members K&S Savage who put on a sublime spread, with many highlights including a sublime chocolate cake, but it was the warm mustard sausages that received the plaudits amongst the players.
The Bagshot innings started with solidarity, as C.Hollaly the young J.White got stuck into the Wooburn attack, headed by key run scorers Bushnell and Tennant, seemingly keen to hog the limelight. Tennant toiled somewhat but Bushnell found his rhythm with 3 quick wickets in similar fashion, hitting the stumps twice and the pad once.
B.Barker replaced Tennant at the Church end and whilst his ripping, aggressive style proved effective, he was unable to find the extra wicket Wooburn craved to bring in the Bagshot middle order, Hollaly now firmly in his stride as the Bagshot score ticket over to 90/3 from 20.
The game felt finely poised, but Tennant, striding around the pitch with real authority knew he needed a breakthrough soon to get anything from this game, as boundaries seemed to come with progressive ease.
This was mostly helped by the quick scoring of A.Dunage, who dealt mostly in fours as he raced to his 50 in barely 32 balls, following up with a booming 6 towards the pavilion which tea master S.Savage managed to save before clattering into the windows, not managing to catch it on the full for risk of spilling his beer.
Things begun to look bleak for Wooburn as Dumage forced the boundaries, and just as skipper Tennant shouted “put your hands up if you want this”, his brother duly obliged seconds later rattling the wickets.
The loss of Dumage somewhat stifled the Bagshot innings as Wooburn looked to turn up the pressure. Tennant used this to explore his bowling options and turning to J-H.Kelly proved an instant tonic, trapping Fletcher LBW with his first ball - Bagshot now 167/4.
Hollally, playing a fine watchful innings now began to find his stride as he crept towards his hundred, a sublime flat 6 over towards the hill followed by a 4 in the same area began to sink the Wooburn spirits.
Indeed, that was the last show of excitement for Wooburn as the batsmen saw the game out in decent style, Hollally falling just short on an unbeaten 92.
Wooburn spill into the bar wondering what might have been if they had seen the overs out, Bagshot making a quick getaway to celebrate in Surrey.
