Two wins in two as Hoddy beat Enfield CC

Sunday 16th April saw Hoddesdon 1st XI travel to what was the ever lovely setting of Enfield CC. Hoddesdon skipper for the day Brown won the toss and elected to bat on what looked to be a very good April wicket. Both Achillea and Clarke were thrust to the fore and got Hoddesdon off to a stable start running well between the wickets and punishing many of the bad balls. Clarke was hitting the ball out of the meat but finding fielders and decided to try going over the infield and fell to a well taken catch at mid-off for 11.

Achillea was then joined by VC Sam Davis and re-built the Hoddesdon innings taken the score steadily onwards until Achillea was out for 33. Burroughs came to the crease with an intent to cause damage to the Enfield bowling attack hitting a six and then perishing shortly afterwards. Once again Davis was joined by Sturdy and started accumulating runs and turning two’s into three’s as well as putting some bad bowling to the fence. Davis and Sturdy fell in quick succession after both making very fine 50’s and Curtis back from a lengthy injury showed his experience and class putting the Enfield bowlers to the sword and scoring a quick fire 35 to end the Hoddesdon innings at 225.

After what can only be described as a generous tea interval Hoddesdon took to the field with new opening pairing of the returning senior pro Walls and his youthful counterpart Murray. Bowling with intelligence and persistence the opened up the middle order taking wickets from both ends whilst being measly with the runs, Murray bowling 5 maidens from his end to start and Walls ensuring that their young ‘gun’ was left with not only bruised hands but a bruised ego to boot!

After reducing Enfield to 40-4 Hoddesdon brought new boy Blemkin into the attack with Fryers but the Enfield overseas pro had seen enough whilst losing wickets at regular intervals that he took the initiative and delivered some lusty blows picking up on anything short and sending it to Enfield Town Centre.. Joined by his skipper the overseas pro compiled runs quickly and effectively until Brown with some might say a nose for such trouble instructed pace man Davis to get loose and open his shoulders… Second ball saw the Enfield Skipper amazingly caught behind by Achillea who was close to his maiden 50 behind the stumps. Curtis and Davis took the game further away from Enfield when the Overseas Pro was adjudged by Alan ‘Rudi Slow Death’ Casbard. Fryers and Blemkin then came back to wrap up the Enfield tail and bring Hoddesdon their second win in as many games.

By Martin Brown

Sunday 16th April saw Hoddesdon travel up the A10 to Enfield Cricket Club. On a slightly overcast afternoon Hoddesdon chose to bat first in a 40 over contest on what looked like a solid batting deck.

With Jimmy ‘greaster’ Achillea and Ross ‘treacle’ Clarke opening up the lads got off to a strong start before the latter being caught at extra cover after peppering him the over before.

Sammy D joined Greaster at the crease and were going steadily until Jimmy played round a straight one giving Umpire Casbard the opportunity to bring out his trigger finger.

Tyler then walked out for about an over or so and then walked back in again after knicking off a half volley bringing Todd ‘one knee’ Sturdy into the game.

Sam and Todd ran well together putting pressure on the fielders with Sam passing 50 and then Todd a couple of overs later (although no one noticed until he got out the very next ball)

The long awaited return of Jamie Curtis who scored quickly making 37 off of just 20 balls including 2 sixes and 3 fours with Hoddy finishing on 232-6.

It was the choice of old Versus young from skipper Martin Vincent Brown with Max Murray opening the bowling for Hoddy finishing with figures of 8-5-15-2 without conceding a run in his first 5 overs and taking 2 wickets, his partner Banger drawing the short straw of bowling into the short legside boundary, he also bowled well ending up with figures of 7-1-16-3.

There was also bowling spells for Tommy Fryers and the returning Jamie Curtis taking 2 for 30 off of his 5 overs with Sammy D keeping it tight with 3-1-1-1 and debutant George Blemkin taking the last wicket of the game and Enfield finishing on 155-10 off their 40 overs.

All in all another solid victory for the Green Machine with the lads going into next weeks games in good form.

By Todd Sturdy