All “L” breaks loose at Grace Road.
No wickets at Grace Rd
By Diamond Ruled OK
May 30 2010
Diamond reports as last minute . com reporter on a day where he had an "l" of a time despite seeing no wickets
Got up bright and early for a trip up the North, checked the MTWD site to find a private message from Kev informing me I had become the designated reporter for the days play at Grace Road. The main reason I had not volunteered to do the report (except for the fact it always rains when I do Sundays) was that I had a couple of other jobs to do on the way to the ground so would be liable not to be there for 11am. Note to self: never mention you are going to a game on the site before a reporter has been appointed! Tasks completed I got to the ground at 12:20 to find Leicestershire 115-3.Blue skies with high white clouds were no threat weather wise, what was a bit of a downer was the forceful wind howling across the width of the ground. A rather sparse crowd, no doubt many of the locals were staying out of the wind indoors, more a thermos than sunscreen day for those who braved the outside conditions. Lunch was taken with no further loss of wickets, Leicestershire 153-3 (Taylor61 no and McDonald 20 no). It was nice to see Lord Ted bowling from the pavilion end for 20 mins before the interval and all the bowlers looked fired up, just a shame the batsmen were as well. Taylor reached his ton with a four which was well received by the locals. The 250 came up as England beat Japan 2-1(2 own goals by Japanese defenders saved Cappelo’s blushes) in their final friendly warm up before the World Cup and England were struggling to remove the Bangladeshi openers at Lord’s having made them follow on.( HI Fisaw to the pair of them later in the day). By tea Taylor had moved on to 142no and McDonald 85no, a wicket less session for our lads and over 100 runs added to the score. Post tea Leicestershire rapidly moved the score on to 464-3 before declaring their innings closed, the record for a 4thwicket partnership at Grace Road being broken in the process, though Taylor 206no was 1 run short of his highest score ever when the declaration came (how must he have felt?), his able partner McDonald finished up 176no. So a blank day for me as far as wickets went so far, I hoped it would continue for the Middlesex openers, which it did with us closing on 19-0 at the end of day two, effectively though it was day one of a three day match and according to the locals the weather for Tuesday is looking none to clever either. Why an “L” of a day? Well my calling points on the way to the game were inLutterworth and Loughborough, then on to Leicester to watch our boys take a hell of a bashing by two fine batsmen. Journey back to Londonwas uneventful and reasonably quick for a Sunday evening. All in all a bit of a disappointing day, not seeing any wickets fall (total opposite of yesterdays 2 in under 10 overs of play).What was good to see was the teams spirit even as the score racked up against them. A similar performance with the bat tomorrow to Taylor and McDonald’s by a couple of our batsmen should see the game safe.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2010:06:02:07:50:36 by Ged.
Good report and very informative.
However, as I said on my postings on the thread dedicated to this game,I thought our bowling and fielding were poor on the day.
I thought you were being very kind as to our performance.
Though of course, we all can see a days play differently.
Excellent report - the reports and board postings from those who attended are so helpful for those of us who are unable to attend.