Wellington Cricket Club

Wellington were looking to make it three Somerset League Division One wins in a row when they travelled to South Petherton last Saturday to take on a side that had won only one match this season and that was against bottom side Evercreech – a side with no wins whatsoever, but the Red and Blacks came away with an eleven run defeat after their fielding let them down at times and let the hosts – last season’s Division Two champions – score more than they should have done.
Rob Moysey asked the home side to bat first on winning the toss and he was given early good cause to celebrate as David Marshall removed Walmsley with only a single on the board, but Masters, with his unique batting style that had been seen when the sides met at Wellington back in May, and Doss added 60 for South Petherton’s second wicket as the home side recovered from their shaky start.
Effective innings from Guest (26) and Bolton (18) aided Doss to exert pressure on the Wellington attack who did not enjoy the rewards that had come their way seven days previously when they swept Wedmore aside for only 55.
Some chances were spilled and this saw South Petherton reach 132-3 at the 30 over stage.
Wellington were indebted to Gary Tillett who wheeled away for 12 overs and claimed the excellent figures of 5-44 as he pulled things back for Wellington.
By this time Wellington had got their catching hands back on and all of Tillett’s victims came through catches.
David Marshall and Phil Nicholls were the other successful Wellington bowlers, but the home side had been able to get to exactly 200 and this was more than they should have made.

Wellington were given an excellent start by Rob Moysey and Mark Salter as they added 60 for the opening wicket, this stand was ended when Moysey, on 28, was caught off Doss and this saw a slight wobble take place as three wickets were lost for 19 runs, but Salter and Mark Saunders got things going again and added 59 fourth wicket runs which was only ended when Salter was run out for 54 – had he stayed at the crease Wellington would surely have won – but with 138-3 becoming 140-5 the wobble had set in once more, but an inventive innings from Phil Nicholls who made 22 and gave Saunders great support and carried Wellington to within 25 or so runs of winning, but a hat-trick from Masters swept away any real hope of an away win and despite Thom Trott and Gary Tillett adding a double figure partnership for the last Wellington wicket Tillett was run out on the last ball of the penultimate over to give South Petherton a second win of the season.

Despite the defeat Wellington remain fourth in the table, but have lost ground on third placed Ilton – the visitors to Courtland Road this weekend.

Wellington U13′s to play Ashbrittle on Sunday 15th July.

George Hooper
George Webber
Louis Corben O’Grady
Toby Jenkins
Josh Pearson
Charlie Lee
James Carson
Scot Davy

Please be at Wallington Cricket Club at 9.30am.

After the summer seemed to have returned on the Saturday, it was ‘back to normal’ the next day as the Sunday XI’s Three Counties League match at Devon League Division Two side Axminster was abandoned as a draw after the third of three heavy rain storms washed away any chance of completing a match that had already been curtailed to 35 overs per side.
Wellington arrived at Axminster to find a good pitch that had not suffered as much through the recent rain as it probably should have and the home side opted to bat first as David Derrick – standing in for Thom Trott – called wrongly.
No sooner had the players got changed and a heavy shower had the ground awash and Axminster’s decision to bat first looked as if it could have played into Wellington’s hands.
A start was made at 3.00pm and Phil Nicholls and Kevin Symons were soon into their stride as they reduced Axminster to 11-4.
Nicholls exploited the damp wicket to get the ball to come through well to brother Chris behind the sticks. He took 2-6 in 7 class overs as he beat the bat at will and claimed two corking LBW shouts to see the back of Mudane and Axminster’s Indian import Subasinghe.
Symons was in irrepressible form as he had been for the 1st XI the previous day and he bowled in the same style – wicket to wicket and letting the damp conditions do the work, he surely had Subasinghe caught behind, but the appeal was not upheld, but he struck soon after as R.Seward hit one to Andy Perry at point and he held on to one and then the dismissal of the season in terms of photo appeal as he sent Axminster skipper J.Seward’s middle peg cartwheeling back many metres.
At this stage Axminster were 11-4 and in all sorts of trouble.
Allsop with a cultured 26 stabilised the home side’s innings as he and Beer added 38 runs for the fifth wicket, but David Marshall ended this stand by making Beer play on for 8.
When Rob Moysey got Allsop well caught on the boundary by Marc Holloway Wellington were back in vogue again, but Axminster’s young guns of Prior (36) and Marshall (33no) got their side out of corner as they doubled the score with a feisty partnership for the seventh wicket.
Josh Hancock ended this merry spree when Kevin Symons accepted a catch at cover.
David Marshall and James Dyke each took a wicket late on as Axminster ended their 35 overs on 153-9.

No sooner had the players taken tea then another heavy downpour took further time out of the game and prevented Wellington from commencing their innings until 6.15pm and by the rules of the league twenty overs have to be bowled in the second innings of a match for batting, bowling and youth bonus points to be allocated.
This fact and the situation that there was more wet weather on the horizon meant that Wellington needed to get off to a quick start and this was not lost on Marc Holloway and Chris Nicholls who had 32 on the board in 5 overs with Holloway having cracked a sublime 30 with six fours and looking well set for a big score, but Hayball got to one hold up and Holloway could only offer a return catch back to the bowler.
Holloway was particularly severe on Fragel as he took twenty runs from his first over.
Nicholls and James Dyke took Wellington’s score into the fifties, but Subashinge removed both when they had made 14 and 12 respectivley.
Rob Moysey cracked three fours in one over and Andy Perry was giving good support at the other end, but after 17.3 overs of the Wellington innings the rain drove the players off once more and with time getting on as well the captains decided to call the game off as a draw and each side claimed ten points.

Wellington remain unbeaten in Three Counties League action so far this season with one win and two draws with three matches to play.

Wellington 2nd XI paid the price for losing wickets in two blocks at both the start and end of their innings as they gave Somerset League Reserves Competition Division One leaders Chard a real run for their money and had the Red and Blacks second string been able to have found another twenty or thirty runs then they may have been in business more than they actually were as they pressured the home side late on.

Chard won an important toss and asked Wellington to take first knock on a pitch that was still showing the effects of all the recent rain, but that cannot have prepared Wellington for the start that they made as they subsided to 7-3 in the space of the first three overs.
Gray and Hawes exploited the conditions and the new ball expertly and had Wellington’s innings in tatters, but slowly and surely James Dyke and Chris Rudd picked things up for Wellington and they performed another rescue act as they had against Staplegrove last time out.
They added an invaluable 62 runs for the fourth wicket as they blunted the Chard attack that had been so much in the ascendancy earlier on.
Chard turned to spin in the form of Dening and Dare and this proved to be a good move as both Dyke and Rudd were removed by Dare’s good use of flight and loop as he got on through the defences of both players, but knocks of 30 and 27 were fine efforts in bowler-friendly conditions.
But their dismissal took the score from a promising 69-3 to 73-6 and another partnership was needed and it came in the form of Richard Henwood and Richard Short who added a capital 67 runs for the seventh Wellington wicket.
Henwood was last out for an fine 47 with five fours as he played an innings that bonded the Wellington innings together.
Short played easily his best innings of the season as he chipped away at the dual spin attack that Chard were employing and he carved out a great supporting knock of 17 – he was looking set when Wyatt got one through his defence and this was the signal for Wellington to lose their last four wickets for 12 runs.
Bob Trott was aggressive in his approach, but was run out as Wellington tried to get all available runs in the last throes of their innings.
Hawes came back into the attack and he wrapped up matters for Chard with figures of 3-39 as Wellington were all out for 152 in 43.1 overs.
Chard’s spinners had bowled well with Dare taking 3-40 and Wyatt 2-24.

Wellington got an early breakthrough as Martin Short induced Chard vice-captain Glenn to play on for only six and this was a good wicket to get, but Cleal and Clancy built a solid base to go on from despite Cleal looking like a candidate for an LBW decision early on.
They added 79 for Chard’s second wicket and this was the partnership that sealed the win for the home side – Cleal was nearing a half-century when he speared one high in the air off of Chris Rudd and Kevin Crout accepted the chance – Rudd bowled well and his good line and length saw that Chard’s route to victory was not plain sailing.
Bob Trott bowled a couple of great spells of off-spin as he flighted the ball well and got some purchase off the pitch too. He drew Clancy forward and Kevin Crout stumped him for 52 and Chard skipper Rogers was dismissed when he tried to hit the ball into the next county.
Hendy with 26 reacted well to this slightly sticky patch that Chard had encountered as Wellington fought back late on – Martin Short bowled him, but Dening and Dunn saw their side home by five wickets and to a full 35 points and a league double over Wellington.

Wellington 2nd XI had pushed their illustrious opponents all the way, but a combined loss of seven wickets for 19 runs went a long way to seeing that they did not post the kind of total that was required.

Wellington 2nd XI stay eighth in the table after this result and the twelve points they received from it.

Wellington had too much firepower for Wedmore in this Somerset League Division One match at Courtland Road last weekend, but the margin of the win for the Red and Blacks was still hard to believe as there were only two points between the clubs going into this match.
Rob Moysey opted to ask the visitors to bat first on winning the toss – the only real option with the way that the weather has been recently and David Marshall and Kevin Symons were entrusted with the ball and they did not disappoint.
Both bowlers delivered their twelve over allocations on the reel and they simply blew Wedmore away to the tune of 35-7 in 24 overs when their spells ended.
Marshall was irrepressible in taking 5-17 in 12 excellent overs of left-arm pace bowling as he hit the right line and length from the off and the quantity of victims that were bowled or trapped LBW shows how well Marshall and Symons performed.
Only Foster with 17 got into double figures for Wedmore and extras contributed 12 runs.
Symons was a perfect foil for his opening parter as he sent his twelve overs down for just 10 runs – he took two wickets as well as Marshall blasted away at the other end with Symons offering accuracy at the other end.
The damage had been done by the time it came to replacing the opening pair and Rob Moysey and Gary Tillett finished the job off in 9.3 overs as the spinning ball proved to be as deadly and unplayable as the seaming ball had been.
Wedmore had been despatched for 55 in 33.3 overs and there was not even time to take tea between innings.

Rob Moysey (28no) and Mark Salter (24) sped Wellington to a nine wicket win as they needed only 12 overs to complete the job – Salter was dismissed with the score on 43, but Matt Colman ensured that there were no further alarms for Wellington and they cruised to the 56 needed in style with a ton of overs and time to spare.

Wellington can be proud of this effort and take 35 points to Wedmore’s modest three and stay fourth in the table on 233 points, this result also ensures that Wellington 1st XI have not conceded a league double since Rob Moysey took over as club and team captain in 2005.

The match ball for this fixture was kindly sponsored by The Mount Veterinary Hospital (01823 662286) – the club and team are most grateful to them for their input in this respect.