Match report from a glorious start, a slippery middle, and a soggy finish at Stratton Park
Oakley Two’s marched into Stratton Park yesterday with two clear objectives. Rattle the highly fancied Basingstoke Capital and outrun the incoming weather. For a brief, beautiful moment in the warm up, it felt like cricket had won. Sunshine, warmth, optimism. However, for once everyone’s weather apps agreed. It was going to be shit later.
Capital chose to bat first and were immediately introduced to the twin towers of terror, Alex Rogan and debutant Ben Weller-Evans. A lovely bloke, apparently. Imposing bowler, definitely.
Frightening Stuff
What followed from Rogan was less an opening over and more a public safety announcement. Absolute thunderbolts. The kind of deliveries that make batsmen wonder if they should have gone shopping instead. Two edges flew, two catches stuck, thanks to the ever reliable Will Rabley in the slips. Abburi and Dabas departed without troubling the scorers in what was the best opening spell your correspondent has seen in 20 years at Oakley. Mojaria soon followed for a duck courtesy of Weller-Evans. Capital were 1 for 3 and worrying about their scorecard becoming a social media sensation.
At 27 for 4, things were still looking good for The Oaks. But cricket, as always, had other ideas. Capital dug in, Oakley offered a few lives, and suddenly the score crept to 95 for 4. Chances went down with increasing creativity. Some drops were unlucky, others… well, let’s just say they would feature in the end of season blooper reel if there had been a Frogbox on site.
Bob Lethaby restored some order with a plumb LBW to remove Iyer for 26, and Rogan added a sharp run out to finally dismiss the battling skipper Reddy. At 92 for 6, hope briefly returned. Unfortunately, so did the butter fingers. Catches continued to go down, the clouds gathered like an audience for impending drama, and the dream of wrapping things up quickly started to drift away as quickly as the rain drifted in. Alex Gough and Noah Beckell bowled gamely but without reward.
Joby’s Late Show
Joby Beatty came back on and ensured the scoreboard didn’t run out of control. Joby picked up three late wickets and now heads into next week on a hat trick. Remember the name. Capital closed on 198 for 9, which felt… gettable, but also not entirely straightforward in drizzle and darkening skies.
Then the rain arrived. Not politely. Not briefly. Proper, match ending rain. The players came off, and that, ladies and gentlemen, was that. No dramatic chase. No exciting finale. Just a collective shrug and a glance back at what might have been. The reality is that to have had a chance of winning, we would have needed to get Capital for around 100 or just below in under 25 overs. This would have allowed enough dry time, around 15 to 20 overs, to chase the target. It could have happened if the chances had stuck. C’est la vie.
What did we learn?
Plenty. The bowling attack looks seriously spicy. Rogan and Weller-Evans could trouble anyone in the league and will surely be rewarded handsomely if catches start sticking. Fielding wise, there is room for improvement. Six chances went down. Six. Convert even half of those and this is a very different looking report.
Get that balance right and Oakley will be looking up the table, not nervously down it.
Finally, a word for Basingstoke Capital. A growing club, a good bunch, and they played the game in exactly the right spirit. We wish them all the best for the season ahead and in their bid to secure a home ground. Stratton Park tries to be a cricket ground, but it’s not what you would call quintessential. A reminder of how lucky we are to have Oakley Park as our own Hampshire theatre.
Onwards we travel…
