A spectacular team performance with the ball leaves the batsmen a straightforward task as Kidlington take the win

As we arrived the wicket was being cut, like some exotic restaurant where they cook the food in front of you. It looked quite green so when Tony won the toss, he opted to have a bowl. Aman Kalyan and Tony were very economical with 11 dot balls to start the game and Aman’s economy of 2 for his first spell was very impressive. It took a while until Kidlington got the breakthrough, when in the 14th over, Terry Bagnall got opener Talbot for lbw. 3 overs later number 3 was caught out for 1 run off Jeremy Launchbury’s bowling. Kidlington managed to keep the scoring to a minimum for a long period as opener and number four were at the crease for another 7 overs but only made 15 runs in that time. After a mix up, the dangerous looking opener, White, was run out for 33. The next batsman to come was Wells who got off to a slow start before suddenly unleashing a brutal assault on Jeremy’s bowling, hitting him for a 6 and 3 fours in a few balls all to the leg side despite 3 fielders on the boundary and one man at mid-wicket. But despite this, Launchbury got him with the last ball of the over as the batsman attempted to recreate the same shot again but a leading edge went up in the air and Aman Kalyan took the decisive catch. From there it was all Kidlington, as the bowlers limited Chesterton’s final 6 batsmen to just 20 runs. Notable highlights include Josh Behal’s first three overs in which he bowled two maidens and bowled number 6 Appleton out for a golden duck with some excellent stuff. In the end Kidlington bowled Chesterton out for 109 with Josh Behal ending with exceptional figures of 6 overs 3 maidens for 14 runs and 3 wickets. Aman was also outstanding with 9-2-20-2. But the contribution of the Charlton on Otmoor trio of Tony, Jed and Sid were the bowlers who ground out the important wicket in the middle of the innings. Overall, with only one half-chance dropped and bowling them out for 109 including 9 maidens out of 38 overs, it was a superb performance from Kidlington in the field and with the ball.
So, with a target of 110, Razwan Dogar and Josh Behal went out. Young Josh after bowling 6 very good overs was then faced with the daunting task of facing first ball from a dangerous bowler. He showed remarkable maturity to block and leave the first six balls, allowing Razwan to smash four fours off the over, and set Kidlington well on their way to victory. The same combination of Josh seeing out a maiden and Raz smashing the other bowler for 10 runs off the next over meant that after 4 overs Kidlington were already almost a quarter of the way there already. The next over Joshy hit a single to get off the mark and Raz got another four and then a single to get the strike back for the other end. Chesterton brought on a new bowler but it was the same old story as Razwan hit a four straight away. This formula continued to pay dividends until Razwan was eventually bowled on 47 with the team on 60. So a pretty good start. Harry Brock came on and got a single but fell foul of the lbw like many others on the day. Terry “Sid” Bagnall came along and added 15 and after Josh Behal’s dismissal for 13, Nick Jeacock also contributed 18 himself. All sufficient contributions on the day. This left Jonah and Jake Townsend with a very comfortable task of seeing Kidlington over the line, which they both did with 3* and 8* respectively. The game was all done before drinks thanks to a very convincing performance from the well oiled Kidlington machine.
The bottom of Division 6 is looking very tight with victories for other teams down the bottom and point deductions for Kidlington meaning that there are 4 teams all within about 10 points of each other. But you can’t do much more than we did today and we can take our fourth victory of the season under our belt and move on with the season.