With last week’s reporter despatched back to White House, it was back to normal with another away fixture this week, over at local rivals Halstead. Maybe it was the early-season mixed form, maybe it was the tension of the local derby, or maybe it was just the after-effects of Andrew Leeks’ enormous breakfast at the local café, but Earls Colne CC came to this game nervous and needing to turn their luck around.
With a near-full squad to pick from, this was a reasonably strong Colne side who assembled at Halstead, some proudly wearing the new blue training tops, some wearing their breakfast, and some wearing pained memories of having been triggered lbw first ball here last season. A late withdrawal on the race card saw Ed Merry replaced by Maulik Patel, whilst new debutant David Lilley prowled the boundary summoning all the menace he could for his soon-to-be-unleashed opening bowling spell.
Yet again, the Wizard of Toz, David G. won the flip and chose to bat. Striding out with his opening partner, the breakfast-monster, the rest of the Colne team took to the deckchairs and were soon lost drifting into dreamland, safe in the knowledge they wouldn’t be called on for at least two hours. UNTIL several minutes later when total chaos reigned as the changing room key passed hands more times than Spurs have gifted goals this season – three wickets down for only eight runs on the scoreboard meant a total rethink on who should be umpiring and scoring, let alone reminders about calm heads and ‘time on our hands’. Aforementioned openers and Sunil all opted for the ‘watching from the boundary’ over ‘participating’ approach to batting, so it left two experienced players, Will Dunn and Pat Kerry to pick up the pieces yet again.
Not since these two put on 350 in an all-day match vs the Wine Trade many years back (well, it felt like that score after lunch!) were the ever-increasing rows of spectators treated to a generous treat of left-right strokeplay. Will’s elegant late cuts – some of which connected – and reverse sweeps combined with Pat’s mis-timed hoiks and repeated tapping of the bat at the merest whisper of a lbw appeal reminded some of the elder spectators of Gower & Lamb at their finest.
All things come to an end though, and soon PK was back on scoring duties, having succumbed to the 14th lbw appeal, whilst WD was bowled for 68. With those two gone, no other batter felt compelled to push on – Shiva was all bustle and aggression, Ollie was overly-adept at picking out fielders with every stroke, Maulik fell to his ‘go-to’ shot (huge swing across the line and caught on the boundary), debutant David was undone by a more flighted ball & AT-A ran out of partners. Only ST-A showed what a promotion to #8 meant to him, out-scoring his best performance of 2025 for the 3rd time in a row. From being the go-to batter for a low single-digit score, this lad is now regularly scoring more than most of the recognised batters in the team.
With lashings of Halstead’s excellent sandwiches & pork pies weighing them down, Colne took to the field, defending 153. Not too long ago, that might have seemed a challenging target, but with more aggressive styles of play and the Halstead nightlife hotspots on offer, the visitors knew they’d have to bowl and field to their top levels all the way through.
Shiva understood this more than most, ripping through the defence of Halstead opener #1 with his very first ball. Not long after, he did the same to #2, ensuring a father/son duo were despatched early doors. Little did we know that the other father/son duo would wreak revenge soon after. And what revenge; try as they might, none of Colne’s attack (Shiva, David L., Sunil, Ollie, Maulik) could dislodge young Freddie Rose from scoring his first adult cricket 50, and despite advising him to take a rest, save it for next time, etc, he then turned that into 100*.
Colne’s fielding was much improved from last week, with the highlight being AT-A taking an absolute blinder of a sitter at point, and the lowlight being Maulik chasing the ball down with good intention only to kick it over the boundary. So Colne struggled to take a 5th wicket as Dad Justin Rose tediously nudged and nurdled the singles whilst son Freddie displayed all the scoring strokes en-route to victory. Congratulations to him and the rest of the Halstead team for this win – special note to our groundsman, set the JCB to ‘upper Pennines’ for the return fixture !
Match Result
Earls Colne 153 all out (39 overs) W. Dunn 68, P. Kerry 40
Halstead 157-4 (27.3 overs) S.Velu 2-45