Arthington 1st XI – 271 all out 46.2 overs	175 all out – Sessay 2nd XI 40.1 overs
Naveed Andrabi: 56 Himanshu Satyawan: 51	Rahul Khode: 6-1-15-5 Naveed Piran: 8-4-11-2

Another five-wicket haul from Arthington 1st XI off-spinner Rahul Khode was the key difference in their latest victory in the Championship West league and sees them maintain a strong position in the table as we come out of the season’s early stages. However, there were contributions from many others that helped the side to what ended up being a comfortable win.

 

Sessay won the toss and opted to field first, which likely was not too displeasing to Arthington captain Naveed Andrabi. Another new signing was making his Arthington debut, this time at the top of the order, and Harsh Patel certainly made an early impression, striking three fours and a six in his brief innings of 20 before he was caught at long-on.

 

This brought Andrabi to the crease and together with Hari Krishan they formed an excellent 89-run stand for the second Arthington wicket, defending the good balls and dispatching the bad ones. Andrabi latched onto anything full and wide in spectacular style and struck several boundaries down the ground and a towering six behind square on the leg-side. He was fortunate, however, to survive a dropped catch at mid-on in the twenties. Ultimately, it was Krishan who lost his wicket to break the partnership when he played a ball innocuously to point as if forgetting the location of the Sessay fielder to make the score 113/2.

 

After both had secured recent centuries, Ridham Satyawan and skipper Andrabi were hoping for similar outcomes on this occasion and the early signs were good until Andrabi, after reaching fifty, got a leading edge and played the ball gently back to the bowler for the simplest of catches. He made 56 including 10 fours and two sixes. Satyawan was then joined by brother Himanshu who looked hungry for runs and quickly began scoring at more than a run a ball. Before the partnership could truly blossom, however, Ridham was caught at mid-wicket attempting to guide the ball for a single into the leg-side.

 

Umar Farooq joined Satyawan at the crease and the latter decided the time was right to step on the gas, as he struck two fours and a six from the first three balls of the 34th over. With the exception of the earlier stand for the 2nd wicket though, Arthington’s batting partnerships were cut short before they could flourish and this one was no different as, once again, just after reaching the half-century milestone, Satyawan was dismissed, also caught and bowled though in very different fashion as the ball went vertically off his bat. There was nearly a calamity when a fielder converged on the ball at the same time as the bowler, but the latter’s height meant he got to the ball first and avoided any mishap.

 

From an extremely commanding position of 220/5 in the 38th over, things unravelled somewhat for the hosts. Farooq was left aghast as Sourav Chandolia was caught behind, Naveed Piran stumped and Rahul Khode, from the very next ball was unable to defend a ball that crashed into his stumps. Finally, after Javaid Hussain had smeared an ugly shot to mid-wicket for a catch, Farooq’s bat hit the deck like he could not believe what he was witnessing.

Thankfully, the youngest member of the Arthington side, Inam Piran, played a much more sensible knock and allowed Farooq to eke out a few more runs before the end of the innings. He was helped by some occasional wayward bowling, yet, with Farooq keeping most of the strike and managing things well, the pair were able to add another 27 runs before Farooq was judged to have edged the ball down the leg-side for a smart catch by the wicketkeeper. Arthington were all out for 271 after 46.2 overs.

 

After the break, the chase started well for the visitors. Their captain was doing the bulk of the scoring in the 43-run opening stand as when the breakthrough finally came via a catch at slip by Himanshu Satyawan from the bowling of Umar Farooq, the dismissed wicketkeeper-batsman had only made four runs. The change bowling of Naveed Piran then brought about the next two wickets via an LBW and a mistimed shot that was caught in the covers.

 

But around their captain, Sessay rallied and though the scoring was steady, it kept the visitors in touch with the required rate. The away side’s skipper, Dave Johnson, brought up his fifty and his innings would eventually include 7 fours and a six. A wicket was needed and after his five-wicket haul the previous week, Rahul Khode was chosen as the most likely to deliver for Arthington.

 

And, like a postman at Christmas, he delivered a lot more than usual. At the start of his fifth over, the score was 137/3 and by the end it was 137/7 and the game had all but been decided in a matter of minutes. The key dismissal came with the very first ball to remove the excellent Sessay captain for 63. The ball was lofted to long-on where the catch was held by the reliable Himanshu Satyawan. With the very next ball, the batsman popped the ball up to Sourav Chandolia at cover and two balls later the exact same thing happened for Khode’s third wicket of the over. The final ball of the six resulted in a simple catching chance being offered to Khode himself, who was delighted to take it and end an incredible, match-winning over: a quadruple wicket-maiden.

 

Fittingly, in his very next over, Khode picked up his second consecutive five-wicket return, making up for his golden duck with the bat in more than acceptable fashion. There was a late cameo from the Sessay number ten who finished unbeaten on 23, but the damage had been done and Sourav Chandolia via a simple run-out and a sharply turning clean bowled sealed the Arthington victory by 96 runs in the 41st over.

Though the visitors never really got close enough to the target to concern Arthington in the chase, their start had certainly kept them in contention, so the five-wicket demolition job by Rahul Khode was clearly the most important factor in deciding the match in Arthington’s favour. With that said, the top six all contributed good scores in the first innings and gave the hosts a very defendable total, despite not using all fifty overs.

 

With the teams around them also winning, Arthington’s league position has not changed drastically with the win, but the games come thick and fast as they travel to Bolton Percy on bank holiday Monday to try and make it five wins in a row.

2nd XI summary – Away against Goldsborough

Arthington 2nd XI – 114 all out 38.1 overs	117/8 – Goldsborough 2nd XI 33 overs
Ahmer Sadiq: 38 Umer Khan: 36	Ahmer Sadiq: 8-2-17-3 Joe Seaborne: 8-2-15-2

The 2nd XI travelled to Goldsborough for their fifth outing of the season and unlike the two previous matches, the game was blessed with glorious sunshine. Despite the seemingly batter-friendly conditions in the sky, the Goldsborough captain won the toss and opted to bowl first.

 

The reasoning behind such a decision quickly became apparent as the wicket proved very difficult to bat on with many balls shooting through lower than expected put unpredictably enough that no batsman could truly consider themselves ‘in’. It was therefore a triumph by last week’s unbeaten pairing of Umer Khan and Ahmer Sadiq that they were able to see off the opening salvos of the Goldsborough bowlers unscathed and reach the first drinks break with no wickets falling.

 

The excellent partnership was finally broken by Goldsborough’s fifth bowling choice in the 20th over, when Umer Khan failed to completely keep out a turning delivery and saw the ball bump gently onto his stumps, but with sufficient force to remove a bail. He made 36 including 5 fours. Unfortunately, for Arthington, the wicket opened the door for further inroads. Muhammad Ali on debut had played a few god-looking shots to fielders but in an attempt to break the shackles picked out mid-wicket before a flurry of dismissals, all bowled, saw Martin Dickinson, Luke Seaborne and Malcolm Barraclough all lose their wickets cheaply.

 

Joe Seaborne did a better job of keeping the ball out, but was forced to look on as Ahmer Sadiq, the remaining opener, lofted a ball to deep mid-wicket to be easily caught. He made the highest score of the innings of 38 including 4 fours. Zaid Anwar soon followed, after missing a straight ball that knocked back his off-stump having already survived several LBW appeals and though Harsimran Singh was able to belt a six into the nearby field in his innings, he was soon the victim of a catch in the infield. In the closing stages, very few runs were added as the home side were doing a good job of suffocating Arthington’s tail-enders and this ultimately caused the demise of Dave Howard, LBW and finally Joe Seaborne who could not loft the ball over a short cover position and instead created a catching chance that was smartly taken. Arthington all out for 114 in the 39th over.

 

Both sides knew, at the halfway stage, that the match was far from over, as the pitch had plenty of demons in it. This became apparent during the opening spells of Joe Seaborne and Riaz Piran that saw the number one batsman dropped at slip in the first over before the bowlers claimed batsmen two, three and fours’ wickets without any of them scoring a run. Seaborne got the first breakthrough before Piran struck the stumps twice more.

 

After ten overs, Arthington were very much in the ascendancy, but the change bowling did not have the desired effect of keeping the away side’s foot on the throttle. Instead, it allowed a 57-run partnership to form between the remaining opener and the Goldsborough captain who had chanced his arm a little on the difficult surface but had been able to dispatch several boundaries into the leg-side. His luck did eventually run out when, predictably, a stumps-bound delivery kept low and evaded his leg-side swing to take the wicket.

 

Arthington were then given another boost when the opening batsman who had seemingly become a tough nut to crack was given out LBW for Ahmer Sadiq’s first wicket. Sadiq then struck twice more, both bowled, in his next over to reduce the hosts to 93/7 and bring the game back into the balance. However, the Goldsborough middle to lower order rallied and was able to inch the score towards the target and though the returning Joe Seaborne was able to pry out one further wicket via a catch at mid-wicket by Harsimran Singh the bowlers that had proven most impactful had run out of overs.

 

The winning shot was played from the final ball of a Riaz Piran’s sixth over and was expertly guided through gully to the boundary for four. Goldsborough won by two wickets after 33 overs of their innings.

 

Despite the defeat, Arthington did exceptionally well to remain in contention for as long as they did against the side still top of the league. The bowling and fielding efforts were excellent overall and their only fault would perhaps have been not knowing exactly what a good score was, having been asked to bat first and taking a few too many risks in the middle overs that caused wickets to fall quickly. Next week, the 2nd XI are back at the ACG where they take on Bishop Thornton.