Bedouins v Beacon – 12th June 2024

Bedouins lost by 6 runs

On paper Bedouins had a strong side out for this home fixture with Beacon. But scratch beneath the surface and you’ll find a lot of those players carrying knocks and strains, and struggling to be at their best. That was unfortunate against a side where you always need to be at your best to beat them.

Having said that it was a good effort from the Beds and they took it right to the wire. Beacon batted first and as you’d expect their side was sprinkled with decent batters. Bedouins opened with the pacey (compared to the rest of us) Bastable with the Skipper at the other end. The first wicket fell to the former with just 10 runs on the board and things looked promising, another comfortable catch for the skipper. He was unlucky not to take a wicket, finishing with  0 for 22 from his four overs but only had himself to blame, dropping a return catch, though to be fair, the ball was travelling at a fair old speed. Bastable finished 1 for 20 from his 4 overs.

Beacon are a canny side and always find a way to keep the scoreboard moving, and this they did. Smith M and Susman were first change at each end. Smith conceded a few boundaries but castled one of the Beacon boys in his 1 for 27 from 4 and Susman managed the same in his 1 for 17 from 3.

Then Agent Stanier came on to bowl. Usually a bowler to be relied on to keep the bowling tight. But he too is struggling with injury and it showed with his last over going for 19. He finished 1 for 29 from 3 overs and Lippitt at the other 0 for 12 from 2. Beacon finished 130 for 4.

In reply Bedouins got off to a decent start. Smith N is in good form and Fellows at the other end played a few classy shots before being caught on 14. Taylor was controversially run out on 4. Susman joined Smith N and showed a bit of his old form with the bat. He even middled the ball a couple of times, shock. This partnership looked promising until Smith N was clean bowled on 24.

Not to worry, the skipper was coming to the crease with the promise of a display of his big hitting. Ah but he can’t buy a run at the moment and was bowled by a devil of a ball that turned nicely when he had made just 1 run. The Beds didn’t give up hope. Lippitt played his shots, including the reverse sweep and Beds weren’t far behind the run rate. Susman retired on 33 and Bastable joined Lippo to close the game out. But it wasn’t quite to be and after a great effort, Bedouins finished 6 runs short on 124 for 4.

So a pretty even game but the bragging rights stay with Beacon. Let’s hope we can turn them over on their own manor later in the season.