Scorching Weather Scorching Result

Wembley travelled to Harrow for what was promising to be a good match already with Wembley wanting to hold tight to the number 1 spot on the table and Harrow desperate to get out of the bottom two. And it turned out to be a cracker of a game with Wembley coming on top, winning by just 4 runs.

It was an unusually hot day with some of the Wembley boys joking in the changing room about forfeiting the game. In fact Vimal Arjan even popped a pill in the second innings complaining about a severe headache because of the heat(wonder if it was just the heat).

On to the game, Wembley once again won the toss and elected to bat first. Once again they lost one of their openers(Karamvir Mangat) for a duck on the first ball of the second over. Hope this doesn’t become a habit with quite a few games still left to play. Wembley lost Jackson Bye too soon after who said got a snorter of a delivery from Ronald Ettienne( take that with a pinch of salt ;) ). Vibhior Yadav was the next to walk in who should have been in at number three, but was busy attending to nature's call when Karamvir Mangat got out too early. Vibhor Yadav got bowled for a duck too, and said he got the only delivery of the game that swung massively(will have to look at the video footage again ;)). Wembley were now looking in trouble with 3 of their top 4 back in the hut. Moazzam Rizvi was still on the crease and looking comfortable on the other end when Dhaval Norotomo joined him with the scoreboard reading 44 for 3(off which he had 38 I reckon). Wembley believed in Moazzam Rizvi too much and let him do all the scoring. Moazzam Rizvi and Dhaval Norotomo then steadied the ship by taking Wembley to 120 when Moazzam Rizvi tried to cut a quicker one from Ronald Ettienne that also kept low and chopped it on. By this point Moazzam Rizvi was already on 83 smashing 10 4s and 3 6s, missed out on a well deserved century. Dhaval Norotomo carried on batting sensibly and was run out when he was on 46 by not such a sensible call for a single by Vrushank Dalal. Vrushank Dalal also added some useful runs before he was bowled by Ronald Ettienne on 24. Worth mentioning Sohil Pandya’s 19 runs too given the context of the game. Wembley were finally bowled out for 199 in 53.3 overs. Wembley would have definitely liked more but were confident of defending 199 given the strength in their bowling and how well they had be doing as a pack.

Moazzam Rizvi(83), Dhaval Norotomo(46), Vrushank Dalal(24), Sohil Pandya(19), Ronald Ettienne(5 - 73), Muhammad Wali(3 - 31)

Harrow came out all guns blazing, probably hoping they can topple the table leaders by being super aggressive, and it wouldn’t be wrong to say that their approach seemed to work atleast early on. With their top 4 scoring briskly. Would also be fair to say Wembley weren’t bowling the tightest lines that we are used to seeing from them. Jackson Bye held onto a beautiful catch at covers to remove James Han. Vrushank Dalal removed their top three after they all got brisk starts. David Morris(28) was looking particularly dangerous before Sayed Aziz caught him of Vrushank Dalal’s bowling. Ronald Ettienne(82) who walked in at 6 looked to hit sixes from the word go and probably did a pretty good job of it. He looked pretty dangerous and was smashing the ball as hard as has been seen in the league so far I would say, he hit 5 massive sixes and I think the ball was lost on all 5 occasions. He was supported briefly by Muhammad Wali and before Syan Bulathsinhala walked in and supported Ronald Ettienne very well, he only scored 15 of 46 but in the context of the game that was huge, and was looking like Ronald Ettienne would take the game away from Wembley. It was looking pretty grim for Wembley and they needed some magic when Harrow only needed 28 with 4 wickets in hand and Ronald Ettienne looked like he could hit any ball out of the country at will. Wembley skipper Chirag Amin brought himself on and here was the magic Wembley were hoping for, he first clean bowled Syan Bulathsinhala and then trapped Sadam Zabith in front of the stumps for a duck. Next bit of magic came from Vibhor Yadav when he ran Saad Malik for 1, well fair to say it was more of disastrous running. The equation was finally 5 runs needed with 1 wicket in hand and Ronald Ettienne tried to smash the biggest six of the game as he had been doing at will but could only manage looping one up in the air to Vibhor Yadav at point off Chirag Amin’s bowling. Wembley won by 4 runs. M.O.M was Chirag Amin and rightly so. Vrushank Dalal, Vimal Arjan, Chirag Amin shared the wickets with 3 a piece. Vimal Arjan kept chipping away in the middle order like he always does.

Ronald Ettienne(82), David Morris(28), Vrushank Dalal(3- 34), Vimal Arjan(3 - 57), Chirag Amin(3 - 15)

Wembley won by 4 runs and stay on the top of the table.