Pacific arrived two men short (six instead of eight) for this encounter in the Victoria Park League on Monday and under overcast skies Chandler opted to bowl. The Tower Ravens skipper kindly fielded for us but attempts to recruit additional players only met with temporary success (they soon lost interest in fielding for us).
Tower Ravens soon laid into the reduced Pacific team. Long (2-37) bowled with great fire and was very unlucky but one of the Tower Ravens opener powered to fifty in the sixth over by taking Gleadow’s bowling apart whilst their South African number three anchored the innings for 39*. Chandler came on and bowled well for most of his four overs and really deserved more than his one wicket. Jones beat the outside edge a few times but was panned as well. Tower Ravens batted all the way through and made a huge 200/3 off 16 overs.
Pacific’s reply started well as Charles and Jones put on over fifty for the first wicket at ten an over. Long joined Charles and they looked threatening before a poor communication led to Charles being run out for a fine 48. The light conditions were very poor at this point and Chandler (0) and Blench could not score quickly enough and selflessly perished attempting to keep us in the game. Long was eventually left unbeaten in the twenties as Pacific were bowled out for 127.
Pacific were well beaten in the end and really suffered for being two short. Gleadow (0-58 off 4 overs) and Jones (0-57 off 4), who bowled much better than his figures show, will probably have broken the record for most runs conceded by a Pacific bowler in one game (not that extra fielders would have done much good to them as the ball sailed over the boundary). Charles and Long batted well and we probably could have made a target of 150 but 200 was out of reach.
