Match Report vs Bacup (Away) 2015

Bacup Away – 17/05/2015

With the weather set to be a little chilly the prospect of a trip to the highlands of Bacup CC was not an exciting one this week for the currently unbeaten Lancashire League Champions who have enjoyed 5 wins from a possible 5 with 2 no results so far in the 2015 League campaign. As was expected the conditions were arctic at Lanehead but the outfield was dry and the wicket looked like it would provide support for both bat and ball to make for an exciting prospect. Lowerhouse and Bacup are two sides brimming with young players with Bacup just lacking the experience that Lowerhouse has at their disposal to be challenging for honours just yet.

Charlie lost the toss and was asked to field which wasn’t too much of an issue as Lowerhouse may have been able to take to the field in the warmest part of the day. The Lowerhouse bowlers started brightly and runs were hard to come by for the Bacup openers although they weren’t giving their wickets away cheaply and battled hard against economical bowling. A brief rain interruption meant that one over was lost and Charlie decided a bowling change could provide a breakthrough. This worked immediately as Fergus Bailey managed to entice a cover drive from Adam Highley which was snapped up in the covers by Matthew Walker to dismiss the opener for just 4 from 10 overs. New man Tim Farragher then went 2 balls later without scoring, following a magnificent, low down, one handed catch in the slips by the Skipper, as Bacup found themselves at 22-2 following a solid start. Bacup paid man Haseeb Azam joined opener Matt Collinge and the pair added 22 before the re-introduction of Pienaar allowed him to gain some swing and trapped Azam with an inswinger which gave umpire Len Dewhurst no option but to end the pro’s innings after he had made just 6. Aaron Fielding joined Collinge and looked like he was in no mood to hang around playing some decent strokes through the leg side to pick up a few boundaries early on. Collinge had managed to evade the fielders for most of the day either chipping it just over their heads or landing it agonisingly short. That was until his luck ran out on 39 and he found the now safe hands of Jonny Whitehead at mid-on to give Pienaar his second wicket of the day. Bacup Captain Matt Thompson joined Fielding and the pair took the score into three figures with some sensible shots. Paddy Martin bowled extremely well with no reward until Fielding returned a simple catch off his leading edge after reaching 30. Matt Walker returned to the attack and this time his spell was more fruitful as he picked up 3 quick wickets to dismiss Thompson for 33, Knights for 1 (who was victim to another great catch when paddy martin took it low down at point) and Bradford for 3 to help Walker finish with figures of 3-23. John Syers was magnificently run out first ball from a direct hit form Charlie and David Warren also followed without scoring to be the last man out with the Bacup total on 128. Matt Ramshead was the unbeaten man on 3 as Cobus finished 3-30, Bailey 2-44 and Martin 1-25.

The Lowerhouse innings began with Jonny Whitehead being adjudged LBW from the bowling of Azam to have lowerhouse at 3-1 in the first over. From then on it was “The Charlie Cottam Show” as the skipper set about the Bacup bowling as he finished unbeaten on 68. Charlie introduced himself to the bacup professional with a splendid cover drive to the boundary and never looked back. He faced just 66 balls and hit eight fours and one six (which didn’t leave the ground) as Lowerhouse reached the Bacup total in the 25th over. Joe Martin made 11 before being out leg before to Matt Ramshead, who he described as Bacups Wasim Akram. Cobus batted well for his 36 not out but it was a straight forward win for Lowerhouse in the League and stretched the unbeaten run to 7 games and left us one point off the top of the League.

Next week we welcome Todmorden to the Neville Gee (Recruitment) Ground before the LCB cup game on Sunday away at Horwich and an interesting T/20 tournament at Todmorden on Bank holiday Monday.