Friendly v BMCC

Winterthur Cricket Club took a day off from Swiss domestic competitive cricket and travelled north to Hernolzheim im Breisgau to play the newly formed Briesgauer Mustang Cricket Club.

A determined WCC drove up to Breisgau with a new positive attitude to take on a strong Breisgau Mastangs. After having inspected the playing surface which had hardly any bounce, WCC captain Mohamed decided to put the BMCC's in to bat after winning the toss.

Ruan and Adam started the proceedings for WCC with the ball. They had to adopt quickly to the playing surface, and did extremely well to keep the two BMCC opening batsmen in check. They could not nugde and nurdle for too long so they decided to take on the bowling. Nafees who came into the attack as a first change bowler quickly put a halt to the flow of runs and also claimed the first wicket. Pip an experienced stalwart of WCC who is keen to make a comeback to competitive cricket was introduced in to the attack to bowl his leggies, he  went for a few runs in his first over but with his experience he pulled things back, his bowling spell also included two maiden overs.
Bhanuka looked promising in his first over then went for plenty in his second. Another experienced WCC player Chris was magnificent with his left arm spin, he was introduced when the slog was on but he went on to bowl one of the best spells for WCC claiming 4 wickets.
BMCC had scored a massive 277/7 in 30 overs in their home grounds with lots of obstacles on the playing field, an uneven surface and a pitch that had no bounce.
This seemed an uphill task for WCC as we are not used to this kind of playing conditions, after a motivating team huddled by the WCC skipper who encouraged his batters to be positive  and play a fearless brand of cricket had the lads fired up.
The two WCC openers Ruan and Mayank started steadily but looked positive and cashed in on almost all the bad balls bowled by the BMCC bowlers. Ruan who quickly adopted himself to the pitch was the aggressor of the two and WCC were soon scoring runs thick and fast, at the end of power play we were 64/0. Ruan soon reached his half century and was looking very good. Mayank too adopted himself to the pitch and they were both looking comfortable and the runs started to flow freely for WCC. At the half way interval (15overs) WCC were 128/0 with both the batters looking in tremendous touch. After the break it was Mayank who was the aggressor, he too soon reached his half century. The WCC dug out was looking extremely relaxed the was things were going out in the middle. It was in the 20th over that WCC lost their first wicket for a club record 182 runs opening stand. Ruan for 85 (57 balls). Which brought Pip to the crease he instantly adopted himself to the pitch after having a brief look. And in the 22nd over WCC lost its second wicket Mayank for 87 (61 balls) so the two openers were back in the dugout after playing a splendid confidence boosting innings. Prafull joined Pip in the middle and the experience pair looked on track to take WCC across the line until Pip was runout for a brilliant 29 off 15 balls when the scoreboard read 234/3 in 26 overs. WCC requiring 44 runs in 24 at that stage required a settled batsman at the crease but the only settled batman Prafull too got out soon for 10 runs off 13 balls. If was not at all easy to hit big from the first ball in that pitch because of the very low bounce and from there on WCC start loosing quick wicket everyone getting bowled out misjudging the bounce. And WCC ended up 14 runs short of victory.