Saturday 14th August 2004 at Bradninch
What a day on Saturday for BOTH our sides, two marvellous victories and plenty of 'tales' to come from those games. Pride of place must go the 1st XI who were caught up in one of those 'real thrillers', with the outcome very much in the balance right up until the dying stages of the game.

What added to the intrigue was the fact that whilst the game was moving towards a finish, news was filtering through of amazing defeats for both Shobrooke Park and Bideford, but that news simply heightened the tension felt right through the team and the spectators at Kensham Ground.

Mind you, cometh the hour, cometh the man, or in this case 'young man' - the person in question ROSS ACTON, son of second eleven opener Rob and nephew of 1st XI skipper Chris. Batting at number seven Ross strode to the wicket at 113-5 in the 41st over, the team still 36 runs from victory, five overs to go and with some tight opposition bowling, a big hill, if not a mountain, to climb. But Ross displayed no nerves as he put bat to ball. At the start of the 44th over there were still 26 runs required but Ross, together with, first Gem Coetzee, and then Simon Bailey, managed to take 13 off each of the next two overs and see us home with victory confirmed off the last ball of the penultimate over.

Earlier, after winning the toss and putting the visitors in, the home crowd was treated to a real snail's pace of a game. At the half way stage the visitors had 51-2 and it did not get much better, indeed after 35 overs the score was 78-6, a total increased by another 70 runs in the last 11 overs thanks to some hard hitting from Clyst number seven Steve May, he finished unbeaten on 21.

Tim Read had earlier top scored with 38, their 'run-machine' Duncan Chave caught smartly behind the wicket by young Dan Hardy who also took a very smart stumping off the bowling of Paul Nott to dismiss one of the openers, but this was not one of the sides' better days with the ball, despite Joel Murphy passing the magical landmark of a half century of wickets in 'B' Division cricket this campaign, Andy Nichols also chipped in with a wicket and Paul Nott must claim some credit for a tidy sum of 13 overs in two spells that realised just 31 runs.

The innings closed on 148-6 with one or two frustrated thoughts turned to the fact that would the 'dropped' wickets - the fact that we took just six and thus lost two bowling points - be crucial in the final reckoning?

Tea time brought news from Babbacombe of a struggle for Bideford and Alphington where Shobrooke had their work cut out too, and on the face of it, given that our strength is in the batting Department, 149 to win should have been a formality. That it was not, was down not to bad batting, we got two appalling shouts against us that saw both Gary's, Newall and Chappell adjudged lbw and the run out of Joel Murphy, when he and Paul Nott were taking a single off a 'wide ball'.

No, the fact that we were only able to labour our way towards the victory was down to some wonderful bowling by Clyst St. George, none more so than from the arm of the wily old 50+ Vinny Chouhan who sent down his 13 overs for just 10 runs. He got superb support from Tim Downer (1-44 in 13) and Chris Cook (2-42 in 13), but it was the lack of a fourth bowler which was the downfall of the visitors, not to mention the feats of that man, ...er boy, Acton, his 25 not out will be looked back on as a definitive moment in the season.

If, as now seems very, very likely, the team goes on to secure first, promotion and then the title, all roads now lead to Barnstaple. The mathematics of it all are quite clear with the top three places looking like this:

1st BRADNINCH 245
2nd SHOBROOKE 226
3rd BIDEFORD 218

and all that simply means that to guarantee a place in next seasons 'A' Division the side needs to gain a further 14 points and the title will sit in the trophy cabinet if we can muster a total of 21 points from a trip to Barnstaple and the home game with Plymouth.