At the time of my last report, TCC were in 4th placein the Yorkshire & Derbyshire 5th Division after 3 successivedefeats, and they were also out of the Cup.
The next 2 matches were against Sheffield Collegiate, JoeRoot’s old club, but he probably never played in their 5th XI. Atthe HSBC ground in Dore, Tideswell batted first. Ben Burrell made 70 andMatthew Killeen 36 as Tideswell made 170 all out, just inside the 46 overs.Collegiate’s Hamza Irfan was left on 37* as the rest of his team were dismissedfor 138, Dan Shirt taking 3-23.
The following weekend Collegiate 5ths came to Tideswell,where the pitch was rapidly drying out after a week of rain. Tideswell weresent in to bat, and the conditions were tricky. That’s putting it politely,which the players may not have done. Only Greg Taylor made double figures asthey collapsed to 67 all out with 13 overs left. Taylor than took 4-18 as theiropponents found things not much easier, finally making the required 68 with 8wickets down and in the 38th over.
Despite this defeat, again at Tideswell the followingweekend, when Greg Taylor finally won a toss, he opted to bat first. This timethe wicket had seen a lot more sunshine during the week, and TCC knocked up adecent score of 186, with Rohan Patel making 58 and Dan Shirt 33. ChesterfieldBarbarians 2nd XI were the visitors, and they made an exciting gameof it as James Carley hit 66* – but Richard Taylor took the final Barbarianswicket off the penultimate ball with the visitors on 185.
On 15 July Tideswell were away in S. Yorkshire, at Hundall 2ndXI’s ground. Tideswell lost the toss and were put in to bat, but this time theybatted out the overs and posted a target of 149-7. A large part of this wascontributed by Tideswell’s 7th and 8th batsmen, GregTaylor (36) and Ian Hoverd (30*). By a combination of circumstances, Tideswellhad turned up with only 3 regular bowlers, but featuring Tom Sullivan for hisfirst game with TCC, and he can bowl a bit. Hundall’s opener Chris Edwards hita 50, but the rest tended to struggle, so that when the final over came alongthey were on their last pair and 26 runs behind.
So 3 wins out of 4 and Tideswell now stand in 2ndplace in the division (the top 2 are promoted). There is just one home matchremaining, and that is v the current leaders, Whittington Wanderers 2nds, onthe Saturday of the August Bank Holiday weekend. There’s no entry fee, so feelfree to come along and spectate, or even support.