A Winning Start

An entertaining game saw victory for The Gents at a sunny but windswept Barnes Common, the hosts falling short after a brave reply. A century partnership between Suman Rudru and Sanjay Patel, capitalizing on a solid Khan/Sciberras opening stand, saw The Gents to the riches of 212-3, a total the hosts could not quite overhaul. Though the talking point after was Rudru's excellent debut, the captain's decision to promote himself to No.4 also proved highly significant. After his fourteen over rampage, in which he carded his first fifty since 2007, he had overhauled his mentor Mark Ashton's club aggregate record of 3,848 runs, though in 39 more innings, the respective averages being 30.5 and 23.6. Credit for Sanjay's productive leap up the order was naturally claimed by Ashton himself, who 'bloody told him' him in a recent telephone call to do this.

Barnes Common is an excellent ground; good enough for Richmond III's until a few years ago. The wicket was true but slow, so slow in fact that Haddow-Allen opened with two overs of spin. He and Nicol bowled economically mid-innings, but by then Khan and Sciberras were on their way to a fifty stand, the latter starting nervously but gritting it out, the former unleashing some powerful drives. Rudru batted in a composed fashion, though with his captain he made hay against the support bowlers, and his fifty was cheered to the rafters. He essayed most of the shots shown in the back garden in his YouTube clip. The impressive Khan should also have achieved this milestone, but holed out when four short, being unconvinced he had so many, despite firm evidence in the scorebook. The moustachioed Ravi Inkollu blasted a quick 14 with the skipper. The old bangers and mash are not usually a good ides but Ravi looked quite debonair. The last 14 overs went for 135, including many wides, before players tucked into a varied and filling tea al fresco, the pavilion being a brisk walk away.

Tristan Haddow-Allen fell early, caught in the gully chasing one outside off-stump (a planned dismissal, according to the captain, who had him in similar fashion a year before), but St. Anne's batsmen Morgan, MacDonald, Hautot and Nicol scored quite heavily after a further early wicket fell and at the halfway point of the innings were ahead of the equivalent point in the first innings, but they could not accelerate enough thereafter. They made a decent fist of it, though, and had wickets in hand at stumps. The Gents used eight bowlers in an attempt to give everyone some involvement, though guest Patrudu missed out. Three players played their first Gents game and one his second, the ebb and flow of previous seasons showing no signs of slowing down.