EYMET v. ANGOULEME, Sunday 25th April 2010
       All change at Stade Bretou ! The 2010 season was heralded in with a new President, a new committee, and a new captain in Sam Harrell. Our first league opponents were Angouleme. They arrived with 10 men but only 9 took the field as one poor chap was ineligible to play in the league.
      

Bill Rhodes and Nigel Jones opened the Eymet innings and played rather tentatively against a tight Angouleme attack. Impressed by the bounce, Angouleme tended to bowl too short to be really menacing. As often happens a change of bowling did the trick as Nigel dragged onto his stumps in the 9th over. Amazingly Sam followed suit in exactly the same way only a few balls later. This led to a period of ship-steadying from Mike Gear and Bill. Mike sadly holed out for 4 when beginning to look set and paved the way for the broad-shouldered Tom Hinds. He started quietly but eventually brought out his trademark six. On solid Bill's departure Marcus Swift  joined the fray and played to character, hitting a valuable 22 before he was bowled. Then Tom was joined by nervous new man John Fabb, elegantly dressed by courtesy of Mike Stratford. He needn't have been nervous as he was soon swinging his bat with the same freedom as Tom. Tom added another huge six before resigning himself to being stumped for 34 in the penultimate over. Their stand was worth 42 runs with John making 19. We scrambled some more ones and twos before closing our innings on 130 for 9 off the full 40 overs – a score which had looked unlikely as we wavered on 36 for 4 after 18 overs.

Nigel and new boy Andrew Graham took the new ball. Nigel kept Usman quiet at one end as Andrew started to winkle out batters at the other end. A combination of guile and wides (!) soon had three of them back in the hutch as they sought to smack Andrew's seamers. However they continued to play in the same vein mostly connecting only with thin air. Then Eymet unleashed their secret weapon – Martin Smith. Eymet has become a hotbed of "ultra-slow bowling" – first Bill, and now Martin have enjoyed great success. Martin's looping leggies were just too tempting to resist for the Angouleme lemmings. One by one they tried to smash length balls. John held danger man Usman well in the covers – all the more important as Usman had just been awarded the Best Batsman in France 2009 trophy during the tea break. Marcus, relieved by the thought that he wouldn't have to bowl a full eight overs then snatched the eighth and final wicket with an LBW.

Hats off all round !  A good team performance and 20 points in the bag. Although our principal batters didn't get going, the middle-order rose to the challenge tremendously. We wouldn't have had a target to defend had it not been for the runs of Tom, Marcus and John. Furthermore, we kept them in the field for a full forty overs with only 9 fielders. Our fielding was good, Mike, Martin, Tom and John holding good catches; and with the exception of Mr. Wides (contribution 16), the bowling was tight and intelligent.  Angouleme's penchant for heavy-batted hitting was the wrong tactic on a slow wicket and outfield combined with Sam's deployment of slowish and "ultra-slow'" bowling.

EYMET            130-9 off 40 overs (T.Hinds 34)
ANGOULEME   72 off 16.2 overs (A.Graham 3-15, M.Smith 3-17)

RESULT: Eymet wins by 58 runs
EYMET: Harrell (capt), Jones, Rhodes, Gear, Hinds, Swift, Fabb, Stratford, Graham, Taylor, Smith.