Orpington
Sibton’s bowlers gained maximum points for the first time this season with a hard earned victory over Orpington on Saturday.
   Electing to bat first on the side sloping pitch (Bear will give the exact angle if you ask him) things got off to a terrible start with AA going first ball to the bowling of Wilkin Mota an indian all rounder, who it turns out played for a Indian presidents X1 against England in February (he didn’t get a wicket but, W Mota st G Jones b Blackwell 28 & W Mota c G Jones b Harmison 17). AA was followed back to the hutch by CC and wasn’t long before the home side had Sibton on the rack at 65-5. However, Brian Washer had dug in at one end and in combination with Tom Matcham they added 40 odd for the next wicket and with it got The Park back in to the game. Matcham eventually went for one to many runs his treading water style of running would allow and was run out for an excellent 32. This brought Si Wren to the crease and he and Washer dragged the score up in 1s and 2s to 144 until both gave their wicket away. Wash batted superbly and was unlucky to go for 48 and not pick up a deserved half century. Late runs at the bottom over the order meant the final total was 162 ao in 49.1 overs but the Orpington bowlers must have felt they let Sibton off the hook when they could have gone in for the kill at the half way point and costly this would prove.
   So after a cracking tea (rated the best ever by Hobo) the Park attack which was missing overseas star Rowey because err he’s missing overseas, set about the job in hand. Smudge opened up, with late call up Trev ‘Tidy’ Lewis (or Filthy as he’s been renamed) at the other end and it was Filthy who got the ball rolling removing an opener with only 10 on the board. Wickets 2 and 3 followed soon after with 23 and 25 on the board respectively as Smudge continued his excellent season picking up both. By now Orpington had their Indian first classer at the wicket but he could do nothing to stop the fall of wickets at the other end as the spin twins of AA (2-36) and bear (2-34) ripped out the middle order. The difference between the sides was after getting early wickets Sibton attacked rather than letting batsmen get settled and it wasn’t long before the only hope for the North Kent side was Mota. However, with pressure mounting Bear did the biz sending Mota back and despite a sting in the tail from Schmidt, who charged down the track to everything in slapping 37, the re emergence of Smudge (4-20) at the rugby ground end soon polished off the tail leaving Orpington 25 runs short.

An excellent result that puts Sibton 4th in the league.

The Mote
On a day where no play looked possible we managed three quarters of a days play, and showed some very encouraging signs. The Mote won the toss and elected to bowl on a good looking wicket that turned out to be difficult to score on. Pards and AA got us of to a good start as they put away some early loose deliveries, however their bowlers began to find their length and scoring became difficult against a defensive field. We lost a few wickets due to the pressure of not scoring, particularly boundaries, before a couple of mini partnerships between Rowey and George and then George and Tom Matcham. Rowey looked in good touch but fell trying to force the pace, and Tom played very well considering it was his first eleven debut. George batted excellently for his 48 and deserved to register 50, however his form looks very encouraging and I'm backing him to score a lot of runs for the firsts this year. There was a late flurry of runs at the end that got us to 180 and gained that important extra batting point. There are a few things that need to improve from the batting point of view mostly to do with running between the wickets and more rotation of strike. We need to run the first run more aggresively and put fielders under pressure and look to turn more dot balls into singles more one into twos etc. This can be done right through the innings not just at the begining and end.
  When it came to bowling and fielding Rowey looked like he has not had a winter off and continued on from last season. He was bang on the money straight away and showed the benefit of bowling straight once again with all the 4 wickets that we took. Smudge found a nice rhythm up the hill and was swinging the ball very nicely and probably deserved a couple of wickets having beaten the bat and had a couple of inside edges go past the stumps. AA and myself struggled to hold a wet ball but still managed to show that there might be a few wickets for us this season still. The ground fielding continued on from our warm up and was very good despite it being quite slippery underfoot. Simon in particular was excellent and saved several runs by backing up a team mate or a making a good stop.
   There were several interesting rain breaks with the umpires just taking us off without any consultation with the players, before the rain intervened for a final time with the game poised nicely, however I was backing ourselves to come through as batting in that light could not have been easy.
   Overall some very encouraging sgins and something to build on for the rest of the year, if we apply ourselves and continue to practice and improve we will better our league position last year.