Abbey Days Are Here Again

At long last The Millers lost that losing feeling and secured a deserved 20 point victory over a poor Newstead Abbey side. The firsts welcomed back Bomber Graham, Rob Baker and Dale Collison to the fold, with Kitch and Scooby demoted from the stiffs to bolster the bowling line up that was missing new dad Rocket Rendu and the loved up Andy Hiller.

The previous day's rain had managed to work its way under the covers and left the dodgy looking wicket as wet as an otter's pocket and certainly one to avoid batting first on. However, Tinno managed to call incorrectly and it was no surprise that the visitors were asked to have a go. Also of no surprise was that KCC only had 9 men at the ground at 1.30pm. To make matters worse, it was the opening pair of Marc (lives in a GMT+1hr time zone) Bailey and Adam (90 mins to get to Newstead from Wollaton... must invest in sat nav) Somekh.

So it left Ted and IG to open up, and soon IG (4) was kicking his kit all the way back to the pavilion, a la Liam Elliott, after being triggered LBW for not playing a shot. The fact that the ball wasn't going to hit the stumps and that IG was 6ft down the track padding up at full stretch obviously weren't part of the umpire's decision making process.

As expected, the track was playing tricks, virtually stopping on occasion when the seam dug in to the Plasticine surface, variable bounce and sharp seam movement. The uneven bounce was to do for Bails (4) as he was caught off a top edge trying to play around the corner. Similarly Adam went from hero to zero as he was caught at short cover to one that died after hitting the track, leaving Keyworth floundering at 30-3 off 15.

The batsmen's concentration wasn't helped by the noise pollution being emitted by the warm-up acts at the neighbouring Newstead Treefest that were murdering all of Drurs' dad-rock favourites.

Fortunately Ted ignored the early round exits from Britain's Got Talent and played an anchor role, and, even though he hated the turgid nature of his innings, it was pivotal to the Millers posting any sort of defendable total. He and Tinno (38 in 61 balls) put on a useful stand for the 4th wicket, but this was to be surpassed by a match winning innings from the stylish Ben Elliott, who made light of the conditions and smacked 35 in 39 balls to all corners of the ground. When Father Ted was finally out, he had survived until the 40th over making 29 from 104 balls faced, taking the score to 119-5. The last five batsmen found the going tougher than young Ben and Bobby nearly lost his front teeth with one that reared up off a length - only a Dilshan-esque uppercut saved his Hollywood smile. 154 in 47 ovs was the final score and set a decent target on a sticky wicket.

Tea was a decent effort with open egg, chicken and seafood stick cobs, mini cornish pasties and builders tea the highlights.

Keyworth knew than an early wicket was required and the home side duly obliged with a suicidal run being taken after the ball ricocheted off Ben's gloves. The non striker virtually touched gloves with his tardy partner before being sent back to see the bails being taken off by Kitch, after a sensible throw to the bowler's end by seasoned pro Graham. The seamers then found the breakthrough hard to come by as Scooby (6-1-23-0) and Dave "F&G" Hiller (5-1-25-0) saw a lot of playing and missing to their good balls, and the bad balls being dispatched. Bails dropped a difficult chance off Dave Hiller at cow corner with the sun coming out at the wrong time.

The bowling change to the spin of IG should have got a wicket first ball, but Ben couldn't take the edge behind the stumps. It wasn't until the 15th over (66-2) when the breakthrough came, and from then on Newstead really didn't look like scoring the remaining 90 runs required for victory. The spin of Baker (15-4-38-4) and Graham (14.1-4-37-5) unleashed the snakes in the pitch and wickets fell regularly with good catches being taken by Bailey, Baker, silly-mid-Elliott, and Dave Hiller who showed great composure when under a skier as Bailey shouted "mine!" running around from 30 yds away, and Dave responded with "no, it's mine!" as he stood still to take the catch. Fielding point went to Scooby, as he and the match ball 'came together like magnet and steel'.

Apart from the annoyance of the final pairing, who gave the excitable visitors a little scare, the win was never in doubt and the host's innings same to a close on 125 in the 41st over.

So, the first tunnel (Tom) has been dug on Keyworth's great escape, and two more (Dick & Harry) could be required to see them make it.

One final plea to Keyworth's first XI next week - can EVERYONE turn up no later than 12.45pm at the rec so we can all be ready and raring to go at 1.30pm (and not still putting up super scorer Shelley's gazebo).