Story My Journey Through County Cricket [C2k4]

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What a disaster! I've heard about the tail not performing but this takes the Michael! 200+ lead? Get out! We came nowhere near to that! I felt sorry for Hegg, fighting a lone battle out there, he looked in good touch. What started the rot was Freddie loosing his wicket, to yet another LBW, making it 5 LBWs giving to Surrey in the innings. Freddie didn't do that much wrong with his shot-selection, Azhar Mahmood just swung the ball too much and caught Freddie in front. It was Mahmood's 3rd wicket leaving us on 246/6 with Dominic Cork making his way out to the middle.

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The big man did not look happy but he had to go.

With Hegg being the only batsman left for Lancashire, we were starting to think a lead of 150 would be enough, assuming the tail wagged. Cork and Hegg's partnership started brightly with Hegg guiding a cheeky late-cut to 3rd man for his 2nd four of his controlled innings. Only 2 more runs were added though until Cork perished, being un-done by a fantastic Azhar Mahmood yorker. It was, put simply, un-playable. James Anderson the next batsman now and heads were becoming stuck in Lancashire's supporters hands.

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Brilliance from Mahmood put us in a terrible position.

Now, running had not been too much of an issue in our innings up until this point, with Hegg intend on scoring runs quickly to put pressure on the bowlers, obviously, quick singles would have to be risked. After running a tight single, to get Jimmy off the mark, Hegg hit another late cut to score a much needed boundary. After this boundary however, another tight run, tighter than the one before, was attempted. It was Hegg's call to make the run as he felt he needed to be back on strike for the next over, so he hit the ball into the cover region and called for the single. A fantastic pick-up and throw from Butcher meant that Anderson really had to motor to make up his ground. The keeper whipped the bails off and seeing it in normal speed it looked like a cast-iron run-out. However, the square-leg umpire obviously thought differently and called for the 3rd umpire to give his judgment. The replays did indeed show that it was an incredibly tight run-out. In fact, if Anderson had grounded his bat he would most probably have been safe. This was of no fault to Anderson however as the bat was grounded until it bounced up off the pitch. This left us on 259/8 and it was time to start thinking about bowling again.

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Bad luck causes the team to contemplate on what might have been.

Gary Keedy next in now although I wasn't paying much attention to the innings now as I was starting to go through my warm-ups. A few stretches and lunges into my warm-up and I heard one of the lads exclaim, "That is huge!" I shot up and managed to just see the ball bounce just before the boundary rope, with Keedy hitting a four first ball, a straight drive straight back over the head of the bowler. Embarrasing. I said that he wouldn't be able to do that again if he tried. I wish I'd not said it now, because I was bloody accurate! The very next ball Gary attempted the same shot once again but this time only managing to connect with air and being comprehensively bowled by Rikki Clarke. Off-stump cartwheeling back, can't beat that to be honest. 263/9 and a top rate batsman striding in, in the form of Muttiah Mularitharan. Back to my stretches...

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One too many from Keedy means it really is over now

Looks like I made the right choice ignoring this final pairing, it didn't last long. Another run-out and unfortunately it was Hegg who was caught short of his ground. He really deserved a not-out to his name as he had played well and the tail should have given him much more. Still it's not all bad. We have a lead of 77 runs and we can sneak in some overs towards the end of the day. If we can get some quick wickets, we're definatley in this contest still.


 
Love the writing Stu. Makes it feel like I'm actually listening to a dairy report of the game :)

As for the match situation, well, poor effort from Lancashire's lower order. Need to make sure they restrict Surrey to under 200...
 
Keedy! 77 run lead is pretty good to be honest, with the super bowling line up, get a couple of wickets before stumps and we're well on top.

Great work Stu, now go and get wickets!:p
 
Thats bad effort from lower order..It seems they just sacrificed their wickets :eek: Nice and neat presentation Stu :clap
 
Disappointing batting from Lancashire's tail-enders but at least you got your maiden century:)
 
Hmmm, confusing. I'm not sure what to do here. The lineups to the 2nd innings have reset back to the usual squads, so would it be okay with you guys if I autoplay the rest of this match, so I can fix it for the next game?
 
Yeah autoplay it, that should be fine to be honest...as long as Lancs still win:p.
 
Okay then I've autoplayed it and Lancashire won by 2 wickets :) I promise everything will be back to normal for the next update!

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Ignore all the posts before this guys :laugh!

I started another County Season with the same sqauds and the line-out fix .exe so everything should be fine again. I autoplayed the first game so we can perhaps get some normality back to this story thread :laugh The table is posted below.

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This is definatley the correct table and the next game will be versus Nottinghamshire

Sorry for the inconvenience
 
Lancs top as normality is taken:D This is our season, come on Culli, bring us the CC!

Good work.
 
Excellent work with the story Culli...simply loving it, also good to see someone else still playing this game.
 
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What a stunning performance so far! I know it's a bowler's pitch here at Old Trafford but to bowl this well so far is a huge acheivement in my books. We all got here at about 9am this morning just to get a look at the pitch and to have a little team briefing where Stuey Law told us what he expected from us in this game, after trouncing Surrey in the first game. Now obviously, this game will have me fired up as you may know already, Nottingham is just down the motorway from my hometown of Grantham so I'll definatley look to be in the thick of the action. The pitch was greener than Jamie Oliver's fridge and above head there was plenty of cloud so the ball would definatley move off the seam and swing in the air. It was obvious then that when Law won the toss we would put Notts into bat first and try and rip through them as quick as possible. Boy, oh boy did we rip through them! I'll just give a run through of the teams first though...

Lancashire
I.Sutcliffe
M.Chilton
B.Hodge
S.Law
A.Flintoff
S.Cullington
W.Hegg
D.Cork
J.Anderson
G.Keedy
Muttiah Muralitharan

Nottinghamshire
D.Bicknell
J.Gallian
S.Fleming
R.Warren
D.Hussey
C.Read
P.Franks
G.Swann
G.Smith
R.Sidebottom
A.Harris​

Jimmy was to bowl the first over of the day and he started off with wide loosener that was expertly dispatched by the left handed Darren Bicknell. A magnificent cutshot to the boundary to set Nottinghamshire off to a flyer. It didn't last long though as Jimmy's second ball was right on the mark, full and outside off with just a hint of swing. It got the inside edge of Bicknell's bat and crashed into the stumps. Nottinghamshire 4/1 and the pitch is causing the batsman problems already. New Zealand captain and captain of Nottinghamshire Stephen Fleming the new man in.

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Fantastic start by Jimmy showing that the ball will swing

A very tidy over from Jimmy to start off with but Dominic Cork is always capable of topping even the greatest of overs. After 4 fantastic deliveries to the opener Jason Gallian, probing and testing the batsman every ball, a short pitched ball got Cork his man finding the outside edge of Gallian's bat with the captain Stuart Law taking a regulation catch in the slip cordon. Gallian gone for a duck and Nottinghamshire now in all sorts of trouble on 4/2 and our seam bowlers keeping a tight line and length. Russell Warren now joining Fleming at the crease.

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Fantastic bowling from Corky gifting us our second wicket

Despite the fall of wickets, Fleming was looking solid as ever but not scoring at a blistering rate. I suppose they couldn't afford to though as they had to rebuild one way or another and hitting out was definatley not the way to go about it. Warren was looking comfortable, picking up singles and rotating the strike as often as he could, but due to Fleming seemingly ignoring his duty to score runs Warren got frustrated some what and felt it was time to attack. Unfortunatley for Russel, Dominic Cork was in spectacular form. After Warren tried to attack a few balls and only managing to find the fielders, Cork decided another short ball was needed and once again it got us a wicket. Hodge taking a sharp catch in the slips, the ball was really moving when it reached him. Our fielding had been top notch so far in this game, a trend that carried on during the session. David Hussey at the crease and we knew him and Fleming together could cause us some trouble.

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Cork is in irresistable form out there, Warren his second victim

Now we knew this next partnership could be very dangerous for us as the two batsman both have heaps of experience and are very good stroke-makers. We still tried to maintain our dominance and this was shown when a fierce bouncer from Jimmy caused Fleming to take evasive action with the bowl narrowly missing Fleming's helmet. A sarcastic smile from Jimmy and this contest was heating up with every ball. A single was taken and this brought Hussey on strike to face his first ball. It was a decent delivery from Jimmy, nothing wrong with it at all but Hussey used his brilliance to cut the ball square and the ball rocketed to the boundary. Already Hussey had made his intentions clear and proving that this partnership could be all that Nottinghamshire needed to dig them out of a hole. The pair were more thank happy to take singles and were not having any trouble in doing so. The score moved on to 27/3 with Hussey still scoring the majority of the runs with Fleming still yet to score quickly at all! So it was no surprise when Cork picked up his third wicket removing Fleming with myself taking the catch at gully. Nottinghamshire now 27/4 with wicket-keeper Chris Read joining Hussey.

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A solid catch at gully by me removes Nott's captain

After some very tight overs from Jimmy and Dom, with only 1 run coming from all of them, it was my turn to have a bowl. Bowling at Chris Read I kept a tight line and length keeping him tied down. I didn't think I deserved a wicket though, so you could tell I was surprised when I picked up a wicket sending Nottinghamshire to 28/5. I took the catch for Cork's wicket and he returned the favour for this wicket, taking another solid catch at gully.

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First wicket of the game for me and Nottinghamshire have looked far from their best

*I'll finish the session off later, there's a few more wickets to go yet :p*
 

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