On a blustery evening with rain in the air and the wind in my hair your correspondent was fortunate to take part in a mammoth run chase by the massed ranks of the Mighty Marsh Mid-weekers – even coping with the effects of Ollie’s amazing trousers.
After winning the toss and electing to bowl first on the still spongy artificial wicket Marsh made early inroads into a sprightly Westbury team with Crouchy, reinvigorated by his Southend sojourn, taking 2 early wickets. but then things started to go pear shaped. A combination of rapid fire running between the wickets, the wet outfield making Marsh fielders turn like Volvos, a far too many thick edges finding safety Westbury pressed ahead – the scoreboard ticking over too fast for our likings.
A combination of hit and miss batting and some good catches brought Westy 4 wickets but when the scoreboard stopped at 153 the crew were still somewhat despondent.
That said the indominantable Marsh spirit was soon to the fore – with banter aplenty as Joe and Ollie kept the bowlers at bay and the scoreboard moving – but far too slow for the assembled masses. That said Stu was able to keep us going (once we’d asked Marcelle to give us some space) with tales of Charlbury, lesbians, Tacky, Crossy and a lack of food and drink. (Seems the crew made up for that later – Ed)
Anyway with 5 overs to go the task seemed vast. But then Joe seemed to be hitting the ball better, Ollie was scampering between the wickets and for some unfathomable reason Westbury elected to bring on a bowler ( I shan’t name and shame him) whose first 3 balls were Wide, Wide and 6. Then Joe was out chasing another wide one. Stu came and went rapidly and with less than 2 overs to go it seemed it in the balance again.
But never fear striding to the wicket came the Skip, first off a few sighters, and then the final over – a 6 blissfully clubbed to square leg, a scampered 2 and a 4 over the covers and we were home. The banter was even better and we all managed to cope with the Jeacock’s sartorial inelegance – oh and the smell of Ollie’s trousers!
The week started with a semi-final vs Thornborough in the League Sheild. In which Marsh choose to bat first, with The Mouth and Olaf opening we looked for a quick start in the 12 over match. We didn’t see that as The Mouth “could not see the ball” as he walked back scoring 1. Sat joined Olaf in the middle to score a quick 18 before being run out. Olaf shortly followed Sat back leaving Rev and Crouch to try to push the score on towards a target total of 100+. Crouch came back with little sucess scoring 5. Matt was then joined by myself in the quest to score quick. A quick was the word as both players kept the score board ticking with some delicate shots aswell as some big blows. Rev was then out for 30 in the last overs trying to further the score more. The pretty boy came to the crease and got a leg bye in his efforts to score runs. Leaving the team on 114-5 from our 12 overs.
 Our efforts to defend the total started well with crouchie getting a wicket with the first ball of the innings. Thornborough continued to lose wickets on a regualr basis with tight bowling from Crouch, Tim dog, Shaggy and I.D. Thornborough finished all out for 83. Send the Mid-weekers to the cup final!
 Wednesday saw a similair story, Marsh batted first and scored 112-4 from our 12 overs with contributions from, Olaf (6), Mouth (15), Hammond (22), Sat (30) (run out again!), Crouchie (33*) and I.D (4*). This was going to e a difficult total in the wet conditions to chase.
 Things got off to a good start with 2 wickets in the first 2 overs, but Great Horwood’s first team class then came through and looked strong as the bowlers struggling to grip the wet ball. Horwood got the runs required in the last over with the loss of only 3 wickets.
 Watch this space with the dates for the final to come along and support the midweek team!
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I.D
The mid-weekers took to the field in thier second game of the campaign with a cup match vs Westbury at Marsh Gibbon in not the greatest conditions.
 After winning the toss Marsh elected to bat first in the bad light, which then saw the interesting decision of The Mouth and myself leading the team out to bat. The first ball went well, getting an early single. Then two balls later saw me skying the ball to be caught for 0. Sat came to the crease to only be sent back after a ”dodgy” run. So numbers 2 and 3 where back in the pavillion with no runs to their names. This then allowed the star man from last week Crouchie to come out to the crease. Soon after The Mouth was caught for 17. A late Wayne then joined Crouch to put on a good patternership taking the team to 46 of 7 overs. Crouch was then caught for 17. Si walked to the crease with the intent to make the scorers work, but he failed, going for a first baller. Guesty brought stability to the innings again supporting Wayne. Guesty then fell for 6, Connor Poole (2) walked out and ran hard inbetween the wickets in the final over to take the score to 82-6, and leaving Wayne 26*.
 We then took to the field in the bad light opening the bowling with Crouch and Wayne. The Westbury batsmen struggled to pick the ball up from the start with Wayne taking 1 wicket in his first over and Crouch taking 3 in his second over. Leaving Westbury struglling on 14-4 from 3 overs. the openers finished with 3-0-17-3 and 2-0-8-2 respectively. Timmo took over from Wayne and took a wicket in his first over to end on 2.5-0-13-2. Gareth took crouchie’s end over and took two wickets after each other in his first over leaving him with match figures of 2-0-13-2. Westbury finished on 51.
Marsh Gibbon won by 31 runs and move on into the next round. Treble still on!
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I.D
The Mid weekers took on Division 1 champs Thornborough in the first game of the season in our new sponsored tops, provided by LUKE1977.
Marsh took to the field first to only see the first ball be hit for 4. After that things where kept tight from the opening pairing of Crouchie (3-0-29-0) and myself (4-1-13-0). To then be replaced by Timmo (2-0-9-0) and Wayne. The tight bowling and fielding saw the opening batsman taking risky singles which held to a run out from Crouchie. Â Sam Bosley (2-0-15-1) then replaced Timmo to take and wicket with his 4th ball. Wayne then keep things tight in the last couple of overs to end with figures 4-0-23-3. Leaving Thornborough with a respectable total of 101 for 5.
As we went out to bat with the opening pairing of The Mouth and Frankie things looked good, with 10 coming off the first over. The runs continued to flow throughout the opening overs but unfortunately so did the wickets.  By the end of the 4th over we had a score of 39 for 3. Losing The Mouth (9), Frankie (5) and Guestie (0). This brought the partnership of Wayne (21) and Crouchie who took the score to 92 for 3. This brought Si to the crease and showed some top running and Crouchie blasted away to win the match with 3 overs to spare and score 52*.
Overall a great start to the season.
The climax of the Buckingham Midweek League Division 2 ended in defeat for Marsh in the final game of the season against fellow title competitors Winslow.
Marsh started well having won the toss taking a couple of early wickets, however, a big hitting innings of 76 from Litherland gave Winslow a very competitive total of 129-9 off their 15 overs, with only 2 other batsmen reaching 10! Stevie & Crouchy picked up a couple of wickets along with GJ coming in with a 3 for.
A competitive but reachable total was the Marsh opinion. Each of the top 3 got starts with Olly (10), Banger (10) and Sat (15), however, Marsh were skittled for 80 all out in reply, with nobody else making double figures.
Despite the teams being equal on points at the end of the season with 5 victories each, Winslow clinched the title by a small margin on run rate. In fairness, having lost to them in both the cup semi-final and the league decider we have to accept that the better team on the night were victorious and worthy of the league title, however, we can be happy with the way we’ve played throughout the season with a 5 game unbeaten run in the league and in gaining promotion to Divison 1 of the BMWL.
The season has been very enjoyable for those involved again and although it ended in disappointment, I think the good laughs along the way go some way to making up for it! Due to me not being available for many of the games, I would like to extend a very big thankyou and well done to Olly for his on-field captaincy this season, a definate future captain of the club. Olly has shown great maturity and tactical awareness in handling the team and made the team play in a very positive fashion which is exactly as I wanted.
Big thanks go to Barry for his hard work on making the BMWL another great success, to Stevie for collecting money and helping with the pitch, to Deano for his umpiring and finally to all the players and supporters of the midweek team this season.Â
StuÂ
Last night at Finmere Ben Proctor scored the most runs ever by a Marsh Gibbon player in any form of cricket. He smashed 132* which was one more than Wayne Platts impressive 131* against Broughton at home last season. If we could have a couple more knocks like that on Saturdays from both teams we will be rocketing up division 2 and 7.
Following a very plucky defeat against a team from Thornborough(?), Gibbon got back to winning ways with a win over Division 2 outfit Preston Bisset in the first game of the league season. Stevie and Wayne set the tone with spells which kept Preston down to 99-9 with Stevie grabbing 3 and Wayne with a 5-for.
Sat & Wayne put together a good partnership to knock the runs off with Joe finishing the job at the end with a 6!!
Following this win, began a disappointing week for the club. First a damaging defeat by Hook Norton on the saturday, followed up by a below par display in the semi-final of the George Blow against Winslow.
Gibbon batted first and posted 94, Ollie and Mathers the main contributors. Although Gibbon were looking for around the 120 mark, we still felt confident in our bowlers, however, it wasn’t to be as Winslow eased to the total in the 14th over with relative ease, with Gibbon managing 7 wickets in the process.
In fairness, the best team won on the night and this leaves us with the league to compete for in the hunt for silverware. We travel to Fringford on wednesday for our second league game.
One date of note, Tuesday 8th July. This is the date for our fixture against Finmere as it has been switched from Wednesday 9th July as we are on tour.
Lets get back to winning ways on wednesday.
Stu
Gibbon progressed to the 2nd round of the Advertiser Cup for the first time in many a year (from my memory) last night after a good win against Division 1 Great Horwood.
Marsh were inserted on a damp wicket with ‘light drizzle’ falling steadily on the trip over and in the early exchanges. The plan was laid for the skipper to go in and play aggressively and get early runs on the board while leaving the more cultured side of the game to the in-form Ollie. This worked well with boundaries a plenty in the first 6 overs with a few big blows and a few streaky edges! The openers went and Gibbon had a mini collapse losing another 3 quick wickets, however, a crucial match winning stand between Wayne and Westy got Gibbon up to a decent total of 117. Westy producing some fine hitting and Wayne batting through.
Marsh took to the field with shirts,more shirts, jumpers and even the odd ‘gay vest’ thrown in to protect them from the elements on a chilly evening. Stevie got us off to a great start taking their opener first ball of the innings! Mikey had it tied up well at the other end, however, Horwood continued a steady flow of runs which looked like producing a tight finish. Mikey picked up 2 wickets and Lewis ‘Lucy’ Jeacock came into the attack to take a ‘four-for’ in a spell of quality. Stevie came back at the end and finished it with one over of pace to take 3 quick wickets to assure the victory!
A good all round team performance with contributions all round. Special mentions to Stevie, Lewis and Timmo for mature consistent bowlings spells and for the chairman for producing ‘my second highest score ever’, with some fine stroke play.
This win shows the potential of the team and I hope to go on and win silverware this season. Another win next week should just about ensure our place in the semi’s of the cup so its another big game!
Away to Hinton next week with virtually everybody available and players to come back in if required. Selection is getting difficult now with so many players for midweek, which is a great problem to have, so the ‘Rafa’ rotational system may have to come into play, but it is down to the guys in possession to keep their jersey with big performances in our campaign for silverware.
Good win boys, lets do the same next week.
Stu
The mid-week side got off to a great start last night. We had a good side out including a few first teamers including Sat (who arrived on time) but he was speeding. The team was very well captained by Ollie Jeacock and a superb new wicket keeper in Joe Leonard.
We bowled first and kept Fringford to 120 off their 15 overs. Stevie T and Matt Mead did a great job pegging back both openers.Â
We went out to bat was the skip and Wayne who both scored 40 odd each. With Sat in at number three who saw us home only losing Joe who came and went within two balls, so Guesty stayed with Sat to ensure us the victory.Â
Well Done LadsÂ
JoeÂ
Alright chaps,
A very strong line-up for our first midweek game of the season as follows. 6pm at Marsh for a 6.30pm start.
Ollie (Capt), Lewis, Joe, Westy, Wayne, Sat, Matt M, Stevey, Mikey, Crouchy & Guesty.
I will be there for the start of the game to see the start of our campaign so lets start the George Blow Cup group stages with a win against Fringford!
Cheers
Stu
On a blustery evening with rain in the air and the wind in my hair your correspondent was fortunate to take part in a mammoth run chase by the massed ranks of the Mighty Marsh Mid-weekers – even coping with the effects of Ollie’s amazing trousers.
