The first game of the Harefield 1st XI season coincided with the first game of Daniel Ogden’s tenure as first team captain. Ickenham won the toss on a slightly green but flat wicket and elected to bat first. This decision seemed an interesting one when second ball Jordan McLeod took the wicket of Ickenham captain Elliott Evans for 0. This brought Dan O’Driscoll to the crease and with that an immediate intent to put the pressure onto the Harefield bowlers. Good stroke making and some loose bowling helped Ickenham to a good second wicket partnership before spin was bought into the attack and skipper Ogden’s decision was almost immediately rewarded with Man of the match contender Croft trapping Ickenham’s opener LBW for 19. Spin was then brought on from the other end and again Harefield were rewarded with a slowing of the scoring rate leading to the wicket of Dan O’Driscoll caught well by Tom McLeod at slip again off the bowling of Croft. More tight bowling and some more brilliant catching by Tom McLeod lead to Ickenham falling to 176-8 having at one point been 115-2. A quick 74mph bumper from big game bowler Tom Marshall was the highlight of the last 10 overs from Harefield’s bowlers as some good hitting from Ickenham’s tail end especially Jack Hayward (70*) lead Ickenham to what seemed a challenging total of 239-8 after their 50 overs.
The total set by Ickenham looked even more challenging after the first over of our innings when Captain Ogden nicked an away shaper off the Ickenham opening bowler Mistry. This brought together the partnership of Croft and Matt Ogden. The start of this partnership was dominated by the Ickenham opening bowlers repeatedly overstepping. Croft took advantage of the multiple chances to hit free hits by launching Mistry a long way back over his head for a massive six. After Croft and Matt had punished the Ickenham quicks, Ickenham brought on spinner Owen Marshall onto bowl. Good rotation of strike and the odd boundary helped Croft and Matt to a second wicket partnership of 118 before Matt (46) was caught at deep cover. This brought Tom McLeod to the crease and this partnership carried on the theme of good rotation of strike and the occasional boundary before McLeod was runout for 31. By this point Harefield were well on their way to chasing the score with relative ease. Two more wickets fell alongside some big hitting before Croft brought up his brilliant maiden hundred with game already in the bag for the Hare’s. A few more boundaries from Croft (106*) and Hatton took Harefield over the winning line with still five overs to spare. Scorecard Link: harefield.play-cricket.com/website/results/4787454 After a long winter of lockdowns and no indoor training, the season finally got underway on a glorious spring day with a 45 over pre-season friendly against local rivals Ickenham 2s. Captain Olly Richards won the toss and elected to bat on what looked to be an excellent track for so early in the season.
Jack Shiel and Will Shepherd walked out to face the Ickenham opening attack. Second ball of the match, Shiel rocketed a cut shot straight to the man at cover point for a second ball duck. However, this early set back did not deter the Harefield batters, as they got the scoreboard moving and sought to take the attack to the Ickenham opening bowlers. After a swift 93-run partnership, the introduction of the left-arm leg spinner saw the demise of Shepherd for 43, courtesy of a stunning one-handed diving catch at backward point. This wicket brought the other Shiel, George to the crease. Some clean ball-striking off the spinners saw Richards bring up his fifty. The return of the Ickenham opening bowler proved a good move as he dismissed Shiel, bowled for 13, with the score now at 145-3. This brought Russ Petley to the crease, and combined with the mighty hitting of Richards, saw that the scoreboard continued to flow freely. Richards brought up his hundred shortly before the carnage really started. An over of 34 runs, courtesy of Richards against the left-arm orthodox spinner proved to be the highlight of the Hares innings with only the penultimate ball of the over going for a 4 rather than a 6. As the partnership went over 100, and the to score 264, Petley ran past a leg spinning delivery and as the keeper fumbled it, Petley continued down the track towards the pavilion. Eventually, the ball was brought to the stumps and Petley was dismissed, stumped, for 42. Jamie Knife joined Richards, and immediately struck 2 boundaries before he too was dismissed by the leg-spinner for 11. Richards was joined by keeper Tom Day before he brought up his 150, before retiring out on 156 off 89 deliveries. Daisy combined with the lower order batters, Dan Evans, James Hamilton and Scott Morris managed to boost the score up to 346 - 8 off the Hares 45 overs. After the bring-your-own-tea break, play resumed with the Hares opening bowlers Hamilton and Evans. The Ickenham openers initially looked to be up for the task, with the first few overs going at a run rate of 10 an over. However, soon after the score reached the half century the first wicket fell with the Ickenham captain departing to Hamilton to give him his first wicket in a Hares shirt. This slowed the scoring rate as first change bowler Shepherd dismissed the number 3, bowled for 19, with the score on 76 - 2. The introduction of spinners Morris and Sam Beacham proved fruitful. The runs completely dried up and wickets started to fall at regular intervals. Morris finished with very impressive figures of 9-4-9-4 and Beacham with 6-1-15-3 as Jack Shiel came on at the end to claim the 10th and final wicket to see Ickenham bowled out for 132, giving Hares the win by 214 runs. An excellent start to the season with the match played in very good spirit. Thanks to umpire Mark Petley, and scorers Victor Devers and Ajoy Nair for their help as well as groundsman Michael Woodwards for his amazing efforts to get the ground in such good condition. Scorecard link: https://harefield.play-cricket.com/website/results/4787504
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We will be hosting All Stars sessions at Harefield starting on the 30th of May for 8 weeks.
The ECB system is currently experiencing a technical fault which means you can't find our name on the list of centres. We are aiming to resolve this as quickly as possible. We will post an update when our name is back on the list of centres. This weekend sees the return of cricket for HCC with a block fixture against Ickenham.
1XI Away v Ickenham 1XI – 12pm start 50 overs. A repeat of last year's friendly marks the start of Dan Ogden's reign as Harefield's 1XI team captain. Dan and his team will be looking to replicate last summer’s win over Ickenham. The 1XI have no other major changes in personnel, apart from missing opening bowler Tom Crick who suffered a broken hand whilst batting in training the previous week, we wish him a speedy recovery and looking forward to seeing him charge in very soon. Doug King retains his place in the side as he returns to the ranks, and Nakul Hirani is included after good form for the 2s in 2020. He will form part of the pace attack for the Hares. 2XI Home v Ickenham 2nd XI – 12pm start 40 overs. The 2XI will face Ickenham 2s for the first time since 2019 a season in which the 2XI did the double over Ickenham. This is Ollie Richards’ 2nd full season in charge and will be looking to start their year with a strong performance with plenty of competition for places. The 2XI have a few additions to their squad. The return of the Shiel Brothers (Jack & George) will add depth to the batting order and the signing of James Hamilton from Ickenham will help give Olly another option with the Ball. 3XI Away v Ickenham 3XI – 12pm start 40 overs. The 3XI game will be a first with neither 3XI’s having played against each other previously. The Ickenham side will be a stern test for the 3s with Ickenham 3s playing in Division 5 (2 divisions higher than ours). The 3s will once again be led by Brett Moore, and have acquired a couple of players this year as they look to work their way back up the leagues. Moore hopes for good availability of players to spearhead a strong campaign. The 3s have three U16s playing, which is an excellent step for them and we wish the lads well. Next on the list of our sponsored players is Jordan McLeod. Jordan has been the opening bowler for the 1st XI since the latter half of the 2016 season, having made his debut for the 1s earlier that year against Tring Park. Jordan has grown up at HCC, having long family links with the club. In that time, he has gone on to take 128 HCPCL wickets, including a best of 8/40 against Amersham. Jordan has further gone on to represent Buckinghamshire Academy and Buckinghamshire 1st XI, making his debut for them in 2019 against Cumberland incidentally at Tring Park. We look forward to seeing Jordan running up the hill this summer and leading our pace attack.
Man Made is a local bespoke carpentry company based in Stoke Poges specialising in a wide range of products, from one-of-a-kind garden builds to made-to-measure bespoke kitchen furniture. Run by Marcus Young he said “my family has been involved with HCC since the early 80s. My father Stuart Young, captained the First XI for many years and I’ve been a part of the Harefield family since I was born. I am extremely proud to be sponsoring Jordan for this cricket season. I’ve watched him progress through the colts into an amazing first team player, here’s to a great season!” |
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