Windsor hosted Eversley in their round 2 clash at Home Park in an early season top of the table clash after both sides recorded convincing round 1 victories.
With Will Banner unavailable Windsor welcomed back George Gould to side in the only change from
the previous week. Windsor were also very keen to see Eversley’s new overseas star, Simon Mugava,
a first class off-spinner from Zimbabwe who destroyed Basingstoke in round one by taking 8 wickets
on his TVL debut.
Weston won his second toss in a row and sent Eversley into bat.
The Eversley openers, Saville and Wise started very well punishing anything short from Borland and
raced to 37/0 off the first 8 overs. The introduction of Allen-Turner into the attack slowed the run
rate as he and Nichols bowled exceptionally tight lines, Nichols was very unlucky not to have Saville
caught behind on a couple of occasions and Eversley went to drinks at 68/0.
Allen-Turner made 2 quick breakthroughs after drinks, trapping Wise LBW then having Dyer caught
at short cover by Gould. Allen-Turner than had his nose broken when attempting a field a ball at
mid-wicket, to his credit he showed enormous resilience to only be off the field for 5 min and he
returned to the bowling crease as soon as he was able to stop the blood flow.
Nichols, Gould and Mohindru picked up crucial wickets in the middle overs which left Eversley 130/5
off 40 overs and Windsor well and truly in control. However a missed stumping and a missed caught
and bowled chance cost Windsor dearly as Eversley smashed their way to 209/5 during the final
overs.
Patchet and Harris again opened up for Windsor and the chase started very well with Patchet hitting
Bucknall out of the attack in the early overs (including a massive six that landed on the rugby club
roof). Patchet also played Eversley’s star off spinner Mugava very well and dispatched anything
slightly short or over pitched to the boundary. At the other end, Harris continued to build his
reputation as a quality opener who is very difficult to remove.
The pair brought up the 50 without loss off 10 overs and then moved on to take the score well
pass 100. When Patchet was finally dismissed 15 shy of what would have been a brilliant century,
Windsor were well on top at 119/1, needing just 91 to win and almost 20 overs to do it in.
Harris departed shortly after for 30, the first time he has been dismissed in 3 matches, as Windsor
looked to its middle order to continue the superb work done by its openers. It wasn’t to be however
as the Eversley skipper adjusted his attack to suit the conditions and his medium pacers made it very
difficult for Windsor to score. No other Windsor batter came close to making double figures as the
Home Park side lost 7/24 in the space of 15 overs and at 144/7 with 6 overs remaining had lost any
chance of victory.
Nichols and Care managed to repel the Eversley bowlers who somewhat surprisingly continued to
bowl to defensive fields to ensure a draw as Windsor finished on 151/7 over their allotted overs.
This was certainly a game that Windsor should have won, dropping Saville (77) 3 times before he
reached 30, as well as granting lives to other Eversley batters that went on to make 40+ in quick time
hurt the side dearly in the first innings. If these chances were taken Eversley would have struggled
to post anything close to 150. Despite the missed chances in the field, Patchet and Harris were able
to put Windsor back into the box seat in the game only to see the middle order crumble on a wicket
that did not really favour either bat or ball.
Windsor face a new look and confident Datchet side next week and will need to work very hard at
training during the week if they are to be competitive with the competition favourites.
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