1s squeezed by Bentley

The 1's squandered a good chance to take the scalp of reigning Mid-Essex league champions Bentley, collapsing from 167-2 to 198 all out in pursuit of the visitors’ 215 all out on another good May & Baker track. Kurt Whisker’s men were reigned in by some tight Bentley bowling in the middle overs and then with the run rate rising to a testing, but still far from daunting 8 an over requirement from the last 6 overs, the new batsmen were unable to make an impact once wickets started to tumble, leaving Brook a frustrating 17 runs short when they were bowled out in the final over.

Bentley skipper Phil Coleman won the toss and elected to bat, but Coleman and his brother Steve were both back in the hut early on, as an early brace of wickets from Kane Messenger gave Goresbrook the ideal start. Messenger and Daryl Forward made excellent use of the new ball as Bentley were reduced to 50-4, with a bit of seam movement and some sharp bounce asking questions that at this stage that only Tom Johnson was answering. Johnson held the Brentwood side’s innings together with an excellent 84, full of inventive strokes (most of them sweeps) and hard running against a Goresbrook bowling attack that rarely strayed from good lines and lengths. Johnson was supported by five contributions of between 10 and 20 from the lower order and it was the latter two between keeper Pulford and bowler Flack, not the first time the Bentley tail has wagged against us, being a partnership of 32 for the 9th wicket that pushed the Bentley score up to 215, when they were dismissed in the 44th over. 215 is a decent enough total at M&B, albeit around 20 short of this season’s standard first innings score and by dismissing Bentley in the 44th over, the 1's now had an extra over with which to chase.

It certainly looked like Bentley were slightly below par when the Goresbrook innings started, as Toby Maund and Whisker started positively against some loose bowling. With the partnership at 80, Maund fell for 23 once spin entered the attack and after Maund’s dismissal, the Bentley bowling tightened up noticeably as both Swinney and Doran extracted some turn and bounce, the Goresbrook batsman only moving from 90-1 at the 20th over to 120-2 at the 30th. At this stage Brook required 95 runs from 16 overs with 8 wickets in hand and Whisker and Jordan Calverley moved the score along to 168-3 at the 40 over mark, Whisker falling in the 40th over for a fine 75. This left 48 required from the last 6 overs, but crucially one end was now open for the Bentley bowlers to attack, and attack they did.

In truth, the Goresbrook batsmen were culpable in their own demise with a succession of big shots being attempted and mostly not executed by players new to the crease, but the Bentley bowling and fielding was excellent in the second half of the innings and by building up the pressure in the middle overs, they reaped the reward late on. Left-armer Swinney with 3 for 36 was the pick of the bowlers with Johnson’s 4 for 30 at the death completing an excellent personal game for the all-rounder.

Skipper Whisker was frustrated with the outcome, but conceded that the result demonstrated why the two sides are now separated by 80 points,

“We were on top for 70 overs, but they battled to set a decent total and then defended it by building up pressure and holding their nerve better than us at the end. It’s what we used to do when we were winning the Morrant league and to be honest, we don’t quite have the depth and experience we had in those sides, whereas the top sides Bentley and Springfield do. We’ve got a group of younger players, some of whom are in their first season in the 1st XI and there is bound to be a learning curve when you are rebuilding, we just need to make sure we learn and improve.”

Another slant would be that if batsmen are going to take time to get in and let the rate get up to 8 an over, then the onus is very much on those batsmen to see the job home and once again, as with the chase against High Roding, the set batsmen did some of the work but then left the finishing job to the 'engine room' who had to come in cold and hit boundaries from the word go. Or not.