Nomads travelled to a new venue, Alexandra Park on the edge of Epsom town centre, for this match against Phoenix - a team we beat last year but who used to give us regular hammerings a few years back in their former incarnation of Epsom Liberal. It was a pleasant, rather secluded venue; even the watching gang of teenagers looked on in respectful silence with not a single shout of 'howzat'. Unfortunately they went home early for their tea and missed one of the great bowling performances, but more of that later.
Skipper Todorow won the toss and the late arrival of several players forced him to bat first. The pitch showed signs of use but, apart from the occasional irregular bounce, played well. Ben Fewson adopted the pinch-hitting role he has been playing increasingly in recent matches and took three 4s from the first 2 overs; a particularly powerful straight hit off Raj was the pick of the bunch. His partner, Mahesh Vyas, began cautiously before striking two boundaries though his favourite leg side in the 6th over. As previously, this pair complemented each other very nicely with their different styles. Bowler Raj and his partner Neil began to find some form but the run rate remained steady and yet another half-century 1st wicket stand was reached in around the 9th over. Vyas was displaying a greater range of shots than usual and looked in fine touch. Medium pacer Lowi replaced Raj and soon showed he could move the ball off the pitch but regular wides disrupted his rhythm. At the other end the youngster Centre (nicknamed 'Ayrton' and 'Curtley') struggled even more and produced a string of high wides and no-balls. On 77, with our first century opening stand of the season looking inevitable, Lowi cut one away to find the lower part of Ben Fewson's bat. The ball flew straight to point which was a touch unfortunate.
Mark Bradshaw, who it turned out was batting with a broken finger, was off the mark quickly but a smart piece of fielding had him heading back to the pavilion, run out for 1. No-one likes being out early but it was perhaps a blessing in disguise as a long innings would surely have caused him considerable pain.
The 11-year-old Medium Pacer Sofiane came on and impressed with reasonable accuracy and attitude. He was not fazed by being taken for 26 in 14 balls by Vyas and Prasanth and sneaked a nice straight ball onto Vyas's front pad. Kindhearted umpire Todorow couldn't resist the kid's imploring appeal and Mahesh was dismissed by probably the youngest bowler ever to take a Nomads wicket. If it's any consolation to Mahesh, Sofiane does bowl for his (Primary) school.
The match was nicely poised at 133 for 3 from 20 of the 35 overs but a lot rested on Prasanth and No. 5 Ajmal, the last of the recognised strokemakers. They didn't disappoint; Ajmal warming up with 2 sixes off Lowi and Prasanth being as consistent as ever. A stand of 53 in 50 balls between these 2 meant that our bowlers would have plenty to play with, but Phoenix are traditionally a strong batting side and the short boundaries meant that we really needed well over 200 to feel comfortable.
Nick Lefebve came out and soon received a nice leg-side long-hop from spinner Ray French to help him settle. The other bowler, also called Ray, had tricky variation of pace and, in trying too hard to give the strike to Ajmal, Lefebve hit to mid-off and called for a risky single. Ajmal hesitated slightly and was run out for a hard-hitting 37. Chris Kennedy joined Lefebve and the veteran pair, neither of them natural attacking players, managed at least to milk 21 runs at 4 an over to take the final total up to 216 and leave the match very finely balanced.
On paper, Nomads had only 4 front-line bowlers and, bearing in mind that Phoenix scored 210 off 35 overs last year against a stronger Nomads bowling line-up, defending 216 would take great reserves of cunning and ruthlessness. Fortunately the captain was Emil Todorow so these attributes were not going to be in short supply.
Todorow himself opened alongside Ajmal. The skipper has been bowling well in recent weeks with absolutely no luck and this continued when the hard-hitting Ray French was badly missed during an over in which he took 8 off Emil. Ajmal started the game on 30 wickets, only 2 short of Todorow's club record of 32 scalps in a season, and he roared in in search of blood. The 2 Rays were an impressive opening pairing though and good hitting, initially straight but then all over the park, took the score past 50 with Nomads wilting a little. Fortunately both bowlers were just too good to be denied and there was a wicket apiece; a caught behind for the skipper and a lovely straight plumb LBW to take Ajmal up to 31. After 14 overs there was a double bowling change and on came Andrew West and Gopi, two men who are very different in physical stature but very similar in their determination to take wickets. There was an aura about West as he jogged in, ball in hand, and he very quickly produced a floater to bowl No. 4 R.Gall, a man we were told had averaged 280 in his previous three innings. That's all very well, but it's unlikely he had faced a bowler of the calibre of Andrew West.
Gopi produced his usual excellent variation with several big off-spinners and got a quick reward with the wicket of No. 3 Piper Masha. It was West's day however and, even when Raj sent the ball into orbit for a giant 6, Andrew showed his new-found maturity by merely muttering some extremely obscene curses under his breath and turning round and sending down some more jaffas. Down they fell; bowled, bowled and a brilliant running catch by Gopi at short third man to remove the dangerous Raj.
Shuffling his bowling options cleverly, The Gaffer turned to the spin of Ben Fewson who soon showed we did have a 5th front-line bowler all along with some well-flighted spin. West held the ball aloft after achieving his five-fer with yet another bowled and then Fewson rapped it up to secure a resounding victory by 116 runs. This was a great all-round Nomads performance from a slightly depleted team with everyone chipping in. Phoenix were perhaps more depleted than us, and I did hear a rumour they told John Crossland they were a bit complacent before the game. I'm sure they won't be next season.
There is little that can be said about Andrew West that has not already been said except that he is Man of the Match. Fielder of the Day is a share between Gopi, who took one of the best catches of the season and Mark Bradshaw, who stopped everything at fine leg when the pressure was on - despite a broken finger.
Clapham Nomads - 216 for 5 from 35 overs
Fewson, 27
M. Vyas - 43
Bradshaw, 1
Prasanth, 34
Ajmal, 37
Lefebve, 14 not out
Kennedy, 9 not out
F.O.W. - 77, 85, 133, 186, 195
Phoenix - 100 all out from 27.1 overs
Ajmal, 7-1-35-1
Todorow, 7-0-25-1
West, 7-2-20-5
Gopi, 4-0-11-1
Fewson, 2.1-4-1
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