Braintree - Halfway house

Maldon 1st XI went into the final game of the first half of the 2000 season unbeaten and only Braintree stood between us making to half time with a 100% record. I say only Braintree but they were a side that we didn’t have the best record against and we had finished behind them in Division 2 in 1999. It was perhaps as a result of our less than convincing record against them that we’d also never had a strong relationship with Braintree. Rare certainly had a phrase to describe our opponents that could only be used after the 9pm watershed! This time we were optimistic that we could get the better of our local rivals. We had won our first six games, we had been very comfortable in our 2 home games against I&ES and Frinton. We also had an unchanged side for the first time of the season. Our optimism got a further boost when I won my 4th toss in a row! You’ve guessed it, we opted to bat first. What followed was unique in my cricketing career. None of the Braintree bowlers took a wicket throughout the whole 50 overs! We suffered from 2 run outs but these were the only dismissals during our innings. The first run out occured in the 11th over when Elmo was run out for a symmetrical 11 out of a partnership of 45 with Dubbers. The second took place nearly 2 hours later after a partnership of 157 between Dubbers and Arkle. For the second week running Dubbers was run out but it was the 42nd over and he’d been at the crease for almost 2.5 hours so was entitled to fail to make his ground. He’d struck 16 fours and in the process become the first of our batsman to get to make a century in that season. It was a truly magnificent innings where he dominated from start to finish and ultimately departed with 127 to his name with the total at 202-2 off 42 overs. If there were any doubts that Dubbers could open the batting as well as he could bat at 3 these we now confined to the bin. In the remaining 8 overs Arkle and Rubber added 66 more runs to see the innings close at 268-2, a pretty formidable total. In a way Arkle, who was only 15, came of age that day. He certainly repaid the faith we had shown in keeping him in the top 4. We knew that he had great talent and that his level headed approach would pay dividends at some point. He got an impressive 81 not out and never looked like getting out. We knew that it was the first of many 50’s we would see him get. A word too for Rubber who nudged his way to 31 not out and hurried between the wickets to ensure we would finish strongly. The other 7 of us who were all DNB’s had sat and watched 50 enjoyable overs as Braintree tried 8 different bowlers....but to no avail. Braintree’s reply was a different story altogether and it took Trevaskis only 9 balls before (at 4:25pm) he became the first bowler to take a wicket. Soon after it became 28-2 when Jap snared Dave Denny who we regarded as Braintree’s best batsman. Rubber took the catch in what we knew as Jap alley, a thin sliver of land that lay between gully and backward point. It was through here that balls would scuttle at great pace. Rubber was our expert at filling this spot and now he’d grabbed a catch there. After 15 overs the total had reached 69-2 and that compared fairly to our own 65-1. That’s where the two run rates began to divide and for the second week in a row we ran through the opposition quickly. Copdock and Old I’s had lost 9-36, Braintree managed 8-49...a marginal improvement....as they subsided to 118 all out in just 30 overs. Elmo (who was bowling through his injury discomfort) started the collapse with the first ball of his spell but Trevaskis was once again the destroyer in chief taking 7-53 off 15 overs. This was his second 5 wicket haul of the year and it wouldn’t be his last at this rate. It also took him to 26 wickets for the season and the prospect of reaching a half century was a real one as it was becoming increasingly hard to get the ball out of his hands. Three times he struck with the first ball of an over as he blew Braintree away, it was a bit of a feature of his summer. Legend took the final wicket to fall courtesy of a catch by Rare and our margin our victory was a huge 150 runs. It was our biggest win so far and a real statement as we reached halfway unbeaten. We had 9 games remaining and if we could win 7 of them we would most likely be champions. Next up was a trip to Ipswich to play against Browns. Our first meeting of the season had fallen victim to the weather so we didn’t know what to expect. This time we would make changes to the team. Firstly we would welcome back our leader, after 3 weeks on the sidelines Spaggs felt that his pinky was now strong enough to make a return. We would be without Rubber, Legend and Ruddy whilst in came Toby Pugh for his first appearance of the season and James Ellis. At the halfway point our main contributors were Batting 1. Dubbers...352 runs 2. Elmo...223 runs 3. Cook...171 runs 4. Rubber...137 runs 5. Arkle...129 runs Bowling 1. Trevaskis..:26 wickets 2. Legend...,12 wickets 3. Elmo...9 wickets 3. Rubber....9 wickets 5. Jap....5 wickets We were heavily reliant on Dubbers and Trevaskis but others were doing enough to make us more than a two man team, particularly Elmo who was prominent on both lists. Hopefully we could keep our good form even after he had his surgery, we knew we only had him for 2 more games so Spaggs return was very timely.