Wellington 193-5 – Ilton 193-8
Wellington 193 for 5 wickets tied with Ilton 193 for 8 wickets.
Wellington 25 points – Ilton 22 points.
After loosing to Minehead the week before, Wellington did them a further favour this week by tying this game with Ilton with the last ball of the game. The result meant that Ilton who were top of the table will have to do extremely well in their last two games if they are to wrestle the title away from Minehead.
Wellington skipper , Robert Moysey lost the toss and was asked to bat first on what looked to be a good dry wicket that should have produced a large total.
Wellington’s openers, Salter and Moysey found the going extremely hard against the bowling of Aston and Sethi, who both found a good tight line and length. Indeed Australian Aston, who had come down from Leeds for the day, found some extra bounce in the pitch, that troubled both openers. As it was Moysey (29) and Salter (33) managed to guide the score to 75 without loss, with some dogged batting that gave Wellington a good base on which to build the rest of the innings. Unfortunately Moysey fell first as he tried to increase the run rate, and Salter fell 25 runs later, after a brief partnership with Richard Das Neves.
Das Neves (49) played one of his trade mark innings punishing anything short and playing the ball through mid on with ease. With him at the crease a total of 200 looked likely, but as he was about to score another half century, he tamely patted a return catch to Shaffique, who readily accepted the chance.
At 148 for 4 Wellington could have fallen apart, but a super innings of 40 not out from Stuart Currall, helped from some good running from Paul Short ensured that the Wellington total of 193 for 5 was competitive, although it appeared twenty runs light of a winning total.
The pick of the Ilton bowlers was Indian Shaffique who’s 12 overs gained 3of the five wickets to fall.
Ilton’s reply started slowly as Australian Welsh and his partner Butt tried to build a platform from which to win the game. They were hampered at one end by an excellent spell of bowling by Thom Trott, who bowled with great control and remove the dangerous Welsh for 20. This brought in Aston who after a watchful start began to bat like a man with a train to catch. He smashed the Wellington bowling to all parts of the ground, and aided by some poor Wellington catching, looked like he was going to win the game at a canter. His eventual dismissal for 83 was the signal for a change in fortunes as the Wellington attack began to re-establish itself. Wellington’s three pronged spin attack of Moysey, Das Neves and Paul Short reduced the run rate, but needing only 60 runs from the last 15overs Ilton still looked favourites.
Vickery and Shaffique were taking singles as they needed them and hitting the occasional boundary, however the stumping of Vickery and some poor running from the Ilton tail left them needing four runs off the last over. Tom Trott was assigned the task of bowling it, which he did superbly well leaving the scores level with one ball remaining. Wellington therefore surrounded the bat, and the ball was duly hit straight to Paul Short who took a high catch to dismiss Cox and tie the game.
The game was an extremely exciting contest and one that could have been won by either side. As it was Wellington have cemented their mid table position with two games to play and next week entertain Peasdown St John, the only side who are capable of doing the double over Wellington this year.
