2nd FP’s played their opener of the 2016 season against Queens Cross-Stoneywood Dyce at Duthie Park on Saturday 30 April.
Some tight bowling from FP’s kept QX-SD to a relatively chaseable total of 112-8. J Akhtar proved to be an immovable object at the top of the order, carrying his bat for a well-made 62no. Top of the FP bowling charts was K Whyte with 4-24, picking up two wickets in each of his spells. All the FP bowlers were tidy however, sharing the rest of the wickets at one apiece. Messrs. Eagles and Thomson were particularly frugal with ball in hand and FP debutant Palaniappan extracted some vicious turn from the blancmange-esque surface. Kudos also to D Russell, who kept with aplomb in the absence of regular keeper “Chalkie” Clelland.
Chasing 113 for the win under the new “no draw” format for Grade 2. FP’s were cruising at 92-5. Positive contributions from Palaniappan and Whyte, neither of whom were afraid to go aerial, along with some slightly lucky batting from Captain Barker, putting FP’s in pole position for the win. Unfortunately an inspired spell of bowling from A Rayner reduced FP’s to 92-9 in the space of a single over, which included a hat-trick. With Barker stranded at the non-strikers end he could do little to halt the procession of glum batsmen trooping off the field.
With one batsman remaining and 21 runs required for the win, things were looking squiffy for FP’s. Fortunately the one remaining batsman was the doughty J Thomson who dug in for a nerveless 9no to give Barker the chance to hit the winning runs and finish on 45no.
Thanks to Matt Carson who agreed to step up to Grade 2 from the 3rd team on his FP’s debut and made his fielding duties look easy. Also to Mehmood, also on debut, who went in higher up the batting order than perhaps he would have wished for. We look forward to seeing what he can do with ball in hand .
Man of the match – Shared between Barker and K Whyte.
Champagne Moment – A Rayner’s hat-trick ball.
