On a lovely Sunday afternoon in north London the club recorded its first win of the season and also a debut victory as skipper for Sam Foley.  The game, the first time LNZCC has played this fixture, started at 1pm in a 40 over per side contest. 

A slightly inauspicious start ensued when the captain managed to turn up late then proceeded to lose the toss and get asked to bowl on a belter of a pitch which the opposition captain assured me had seen hundreds of runs scored the previous day.  Going out to bowl with 10 men (Reinholds had been led to believe the game started at 2pm by Burge) and only 3 specialist bowlers the signs did not look promising.

However some very tight early bowling by Gale and Morgan and a run out in the third over from Tippen gave the team some confidence.  The early stages of the innings were punctuated by a lesson in fast bowling given by Mr Gale to the young opener from Hampstead.  After having scored only about 20 runs from the opening 10 overs the Hampstead player decided to charge down the pitch to Gale.  No runs were scored but Gale gave the young man a quiet stare of indignation and then went back to his mark and proceeded to bowl a bouncer that hit the batsman square on his helmet.

With the equilibrium restored even a change of bowling at either end did not change the status quo as tight bowling and good fielding from LNZCC squeezed the life out of the Hampstead innings.  Reinholds bowling for the first time in about 2 years settled down well after a few wides in his opening two overs.  The star however was Mark Solomann whose 10 tight overs resulted in 3 wickets and only 27 runs.  A flurry of wickets towards the end netted Gale and Solomann a couple of wickets each and a couple of run outs.  After 40 overs Hampstead had reached 166/9, an excellent effort by the bowlers and fielders.

The LNZCC innings started in impressive fashion with the scorecard saying 1 (legitimate) ball bowled 17 runs on the board after Foley took 3 consecutive fours off no balls from the oppositions star 1^st team bowler.  In the end 23 came off the first over and the target was looking well within reach.  The Hampstead 1^st team opening bowler was having a bad day as he was run out in the third over of their innings having faced 1 ball and then went for 50 off six overs with the ball. 

The losses of Fanning, batting with a runner after injuring a hamstring in the field, and Foley did not slow down the momentum for LNZCC as Burge came in and bludgeoned a quickfire 58 and Chapman-Smith compiled an accomplished 33.  It was left to Tippen and Perky to finish the game off and LNZCC had made 170/4 off 20.1 overs to record an excellent and well deserved victory.

Overall it was an enjoyable day and a game which will surely become a favourite part of our fixture list for many years to come.

Aaron Gale         10    2   25    2

Dave Morgan        10    2   48    0

Mark Solomann      10    1   27    3

Reinholds          10    0   51    1

Extras 19