Welcome to this week’s Wizzy News with lots to report on as usual

Honours Boards

A very full Honours board this week which includes a set of twins and two players who get three mentions on the board. We also have an 8 year old player who played for Girls under 11 team nominated as player of the match by the opposition. Well done Philippa ! Congratulations to all who made it onto the board this week.

Sizzling performance by Fizz

We always like to keep tabs on our players when they play for their schools and we were delighted to hear that Fizz Gadd scored her undefeated maiden half century in the Seaford U14A game against Brighton U14A played at Seaford’s picturesque grounds. Fizz knocked off her 52 runs against a strong bowling attack using the pace of the ball and clever placement to find her boundaries.

Congratulations Fizz – we are certainly not surprised to hear of your fantastic acheivement. We are incredibly proud of you and will watching out for you in your future games with keen interest.

Match reports

First X1 vs Crawley

Wisborough Green lose to Crawley who recovered in their innings better than they re-covered their pitch

Skipper finally lost the toss and Green would field first for the 2nd time in the season.

Wisborough got off to a great start with the ball keeping things tight, Will picking up 3 wickets and a smart run out from Chris Douglas, leaving the home side on 20 for 4. Crawley then soaked up the pressure well on a tricky dry pitch, rotating the strike eventually taking advantage of a couple of bad overs before a downpour hit. As the home team scampered inside it, after 10mins it eventually dawned on them that covers might be useful.

No time was lost as tea was taken but the ball skidded on nicely after that. Throw in some poor fielding and the innings was getting away from Wisborough. J Farmer was the one to break through getting both batters from the stubborn Crawley partnership, Jnr taking a good catch running in from the boundary. Rejuvenated in the field and with the ball Wisborough finished as they started restricting Crawley to 208/9.

The pitch continued to dry and conditions reverted back to its former tricky self. SCS scored well, chancing his luck a number of times but fortunately dropped. Not so lucky at the other end as Chris departed, followed by Ash who was caught one handed by one of the least agile fielders out there. Steve’s luck ran out followed soon after by Hoppo and DJ.

Will Dixon and Farmer teamed up well with the former hitting some one-legged flicks to the boundary just as the required rate had increased. However, as with last week another batter playing well, was run out as Will stretched for an ill-advised second run.

Running out of overs and wickets, with a pitch turning square what little chance of a win faded quickly until Wisborough were all out for 143.

Very disappointing given the start of the match and the opposition we were playing. A lack of a genuine spinner having an impact but ultimately every one of the 1st XI need to take responsibility for their performance and look to improve. Three Bridges 2’s Away next Saturday

Please click here for the full scorecard

James Rainford (Junior aka JR))

Under 16 vs Slinfold

The Under 16s were at home against Slinfold on a very sunny Sunday morning. We lost the toss which left Wisborough to be put into bat on a very wet wicket due to the rain the night before.

This didn’t faze us as Ran Dawson and Harry Hunter got us off to a very quick start; with Ran scoring 46* off 21 balls and Harry Hunter scoring 41* off 26 balls. This left Oscar Warmington and Joe Reed to the crease to hit some bombs against some loose bowling and leave Wisborough at 215-4 after 20 overs. Shout out to Jackson McCullagh for scoring a respectable 11* at a run a ball.

With a big total to defend, Wizzy felt confident going into the bowling innings ready to take some wickets. We got off to a great start when a run out opportunity was given to us first ball, however, following some pretty loose keeping, it came to nort. #chinupharryhunter. Despite this, Ran and Oscar bowled tight opening spells with Oscar getting 3 wickets. Kit Witheridge and Jackson McCullagh bowled some nice stuff to keep them from scoring below the required run rate. After this came Seb Scrase who was playing a few age groups above and bowled very nicely by taking a wicket in his first game for the under 16s, very well done to him. This then led to the superstar under 12s to bowl, Harry Maggs and Hector Dawson bowled 2 overs each and bowled tightly by restricting the flow of runs, with Hector taking a wicket in the process with the help of some brilliant catching by Jackson. Not bad for players playing 4 years up. Matt Ritchie bowled a nice death spell at the end as well.

A convincing win for Wizzy by 114 runs. We move onto our next game in 2 weeks’ time against Horsham in a top of the table clash.

Oscar Warmington

Please click here for the scorecard

Under 12 vs Slinfold

The under 12’s travelled to the picturesque Slinfold grounds on a warm, cloudy and muggy Saturday morning. Slinfold’s new pavilion is nearly complete and we managed to have a sneak peak at their brand new facilities which look fantastic. It hopefully wont be too long before we can welcome Slinfold to our new brand Wisborough Green pavilion.

Slinfold won the toss and elected to field first.

Skipper Harry Maggs and Henry Foden got the innings off to a good start with some great shots and quick running between the wickets. Harry in particular showed the bowlers no mercy and smacked the ball to all parts. Henry was unlucky to be bowled and Olivia Boyce joined Harry at the crease, continuing the good work of the opening pair. Olivia was also in no mood to hang around and along with Harry kept the scoreboard ticking along at a blistering pace. Harry who looked in top form retired on 29 – the first time he has ever retired – after hitting some magificient fours. Harry has worked incredibly hard at his game and the smile on his face after his innings was priceless – it’s what its all about !!

Bella joined her twin sister Olivia at the crease and the two of them kept the momentum going with some hard hitting and good running between the wickets. Bella was unfortunately caught after hitting a couple of classy fours and Buddy joined Olivia at the crease. Olivia retired shortly thereafter after another fine innings and Max Vasadi joined Buddy in the middle. Both players sensed the energy of the previous batters and took advantage of some poor bowling at times – hitting a number of fours between them and Buddy hitting a magnificant 6. It was real joy to watch the batters play with such confidence, freedom and energy.

Wisborough’s innings finished on 158 after 20 overs with only 2 wickets down.

Olivia opened the bowling and immediately struck with the second ball of her first over after the batters got themselves into a tangle with their calling. Freddie joined the attack and he and Olivia pinned the batters back limiting them to only 10 runs off 4 overs.

Hector was called into the attack and as he ran in to bowl you could sense that something special was about to be unleashed. There was real intent in the runup – it was like watching a young Stuart Broad (albeit with slightly shorter legs) steaming into the attack against the Australians in the Ashes. The batter lashed out at the ball only to sky it into Freddie’s welcoming hands – one ball bowled – one wicket down. The next batter arrived at the crease and Hector was fired up. The second ball was launched and the batter nicked it straight into keeper Bella’s safe hands. The team were ecstatic. Two balls bowled – two wickets down. As Hector calmly walked back to his mark you could sense the energy. Could he – would he be able to bag another scalp to claim his hattrick ? There was a feeling of expectation in the air. Who would want to be the batter at that moment. You could hear a pin drop as the Wisborough supporters willed Hector on in his quest to claim his third. He turned and started his runup with a steely determination in his eyes as he delivered an unplayable ball – the bails went flying to Wales (as they say) and victim number 3 in the bag as the batter was sent packing – Hector had bagged his first ever hattrick. The team and crowd erupted – what a special moment for such a likeable lad. The score at the end of Hector’s over was 14 for 4 after being 10 for 1 at the start of the over. The game was virtually over.

We had agreed with Slinfold that the game would be classified as a friendly as they had a few overage players and we would bowl our fully alloted 20 overs with their batters able to return to the crease.

Our bowlers continued to bowl with good accuracy and after 10 overs Slinfold had only ammassed 49 runs.

All our bowlers were given a runout and it was good to see Lucas bowling with a lot more rythum and confidence.

Hector was brought into the attack for one last time and bowled a corker of a slower ball to dismiss yet another hapless batter. He was taking wickets for fun.

Harry Maggs bowled with great pace and accuracy and bagged the last wicket of the game in the final over of the match

A very pleasing morning of cricket with some great individual performances which sealed a convincing victory.

There is always a lot to reflect on after a game and one key learning points was that there can only be one captain on the field. There are a lot of strong characters in the team which is always good, but everyone needs to remember that it is the captain who makes the decision on the field and everyone takes the lead from the captain. The players also all recognised that our fielding was ordinary at times and it is certainly an area we will need to focus on in future games. Our bowlers will also need to practice bowling uphill as a few struggled to find the right length bowling up the hill.

It’s been great to watch the players grow in confidence and develop their game this season – there is a real positive spirit in the team which is so good to see. I suspect that they will all be looking forward to the next game – they aren’t the only ones !

Many thanks as always to Kirsty for scoring and Tom and Bobby for umpiring.

Please click here for the full scorecard

Peter Klein

Under 11 girls vs Southwater

What a wonderful evening of cricket for the U11 girls team. A few special mentions – it was Frankie’s debut game and she took a run out wicket, Pip bowled so well given she was by far the youngest on the team, Margot took a run out wicket, Jo stopped a four with some impressive fielding, Harriet captained the team brilliantly and was awesome behind the wicket as partner to Eva’s fab fielding, Matilda was quick thinking at the wicket as well and Lucy bowed like a pro as usual. Well done girls – I am beyond proud – we might not have won the game but you are all winners in my eyes. Thanks as ever to Peter for umpiring.

Sarah Meurer

Under 10’s vs Storrington

On a bright Saturday morning, William captained the team, won the toss and put Storrington into bat. He must have had his Weetabix as he opened the bowling with very accurate line and length deliveries giving away no extras and restricting runs from Storrington’s openers.

We welcomed Sam back for his first match this season and he showed no ring rust partnering William putting pressure on their openers and limiting runs.

Really pleased with Zach who is growing week by week keeping wicket, nothing gets passed him!

Fred , Freddie, Zach and Edward kept the momentum up and save for a few fielding errors should have taken wickets.

Hugo and Callum finished the 1st innings, and I was delighted to see Hugo in his first game take his first wicket of the season bowled!!

It turned to Wisborough’s to bat and chase down 263 to win. I was pleased to see a massive improvement in our calling and running between the stumps. However whilst there was commitment and guile the score board was not ticking over.

The final pairing of Hugo and Callum put in a cameo performance hitting boundaries and running the between the stumps really well to put on 14 runs.

We will continue to work on our batting in training

Darren Hunter

Upcoming Fixtures this week

All of our age group fixtures are available on the ECB’s Placycricket website – please click here for list of all of our fixtures. A hard copy of the fixture card is available at the Pavilion – please do grab a copy. Please click here for an electronic copy

A busy week of cricket ahead :

• Our First X1 are away at Three Bridges at 12:30 on Saturday and our Second X1 have a home game against Chippingdale. Please click here for the team selections.
• The Under 10’s are away to Steyning at 9:00 am on Saturday and our under 12’s are at home against Horsham at 9:00 am
• Our under 14’s are at home to Horsham on Sunday at 9am
• Our Ladies team will be in action on Sunday at 2pm against Slinfold away

We are expecting very hot conditions again this weekend – players need to ensure that they drink plenty water before, during and after their matches, and apply lots of suncream

Spotted out and about

That’s it for this week.

Have a great cricketing week 🏏😊

Cheers

Wizzy