2009

ST.AULAYE v. EYMET,
La Prairie, Sunday 7th June 2009.
Report by Nigel Jones

Eymet's topsy-turvy season continued with a crushing league win over St.Aulaye.
After Saturday's heavy rain we were glad to find the game on and La Prairie in a decent state. David Horlock, Eymet’s captain, duly won the toss and strode out to the middle with Simon Palmer, but like Angouleme, St. Aulaye are having membership difficulties, so they took the field with only nine men.

Irfan Sheik and young Harding both bowled tricky opening spells and David was back in the hutch for 11 in the 5th over. Nigel Jones, somewhat circumspect after his duck at Giscours, then supported Simon who was batting as if inspired by New Zealand's 6-over thrashing of Scotland in the 20/20 World Cup. They took the score to over 100 by the 20th over when Simon nobly fell on his sword for an entertaining 54, allowing Sam Harrell to come in. The two bided their time knowing St.Aulaye didn't really have five front-line bowlers. Having said that, the combination of slow bowlers on a slow wicket with a lush outfield did present certain difficulties, so our pair waited for the short ones, which they mostly deposited in an arc between long-on and square leg. Nigel reached 50 sedately then sped on to 110 before he too committed hara-kiri. This must have upset Sam who got out the next ball for a stylish 28, leaving Marcus Swift and Tom Hinds to deliver the 'coup de grace'. Sixes and fours came in a flurry - Marcus showing great power in his driving. Tom was no slouch either and the two carved a further 50 runs from the last 6 overs. In all 177 came from the last 20 overs to take us to a mammoth 279.

St.Aulaye were predictably down, and this was compounded by menacing bowling from Vince 'No Name' Morgan and Alan 'The Cobra' Coombe. After only a few overs Vince bowled a beautiful full-length ball to castle Harding and Irfan followed shortly after, caught in the gully off a swinging Alan. Predictably the run rate slowed and Terry Bishop and Chris Farrell allowed no respite. Chris then broke the deadlock with a sublime swoop and direct hit from square leg to run out a disbelieving Wynford Hicks. Vince changed ends and came up trumps causing Tim Williams to play on - another canny bowling change by our cunning skipper Horlock. His 'pièce de résistance' was then to introduce himself into the bowling attack. As this is a very rare occurrence indeed, the shocked batsmen shovelled one of his deliveries into the safe hands of 'The Cobra' at short-midwicket. Bill Rhodes bowled economically too and Tom, after a wobbly first over, gave Sam his first stumping for Eymet. St Aulaye’s innings petered out at 92 for 6 off the allotted 40 overs, although veteran Barry did strike a couple of lusty blows at the end.
We hope news of our victory will cheer stalwart John Wall who is recovering from an elbow operation.

RESULT: EYMET WON BY 187 RUNS
EYMET 279-4 off 40 overs (S.Palmer 54, N.Jones 110)
ST.AULAYE 92-6 off 40 overs (V.Morgan 2 for 17)

N.B. Oddly the Cricket France website reports D.Horlock as having taken 3 for 8. They must have difficuties with his handwriting or his accent as, in fact, his figures were 2-0-9-1. Strange that !

Our thanks as ever to the kind sponsorship of L’épicerie Anglaise.