Scorecard

Falkland XI v Forfarshire Cricket Club Forthill XI on Thu 14 Aug 2008 at 6.00pm sharp
Forfarshire Cricket Club Won 7 wickets

Match report After what seemed like weeks of trying and months of raining, the 2008 Two Counties Cup Final finally took place at Doo’cot Park in Perth.

The two sides involved – Forthill XI and Falkland XI had differing build ups to the game.

The Fife lads arrived en masse at 5.15pm and indulged in various catching, bowling and throwing exercises and generally set about some serious team bonding and were clearly intent on focusing on the game ahead.

The Broughty Ferry lads in traditional fashion arrived in varying degrees of lateness, two players got lost and two actually contrived to arrive after the allotted start time. No surprise then that Falkland got off to the better start and raced to 64 off the first 9 overs. This was clearly Forthill’s warm up period because from that point onwards the game swung in their favour and a succession of wickets fell and the run rate slowed dramatically. Good bowling performances from the combined quartet of Mo, Jalees, Andy and Elliot meant the Falkland innings closed on 116 for 7 and in spite of a softish wicket this seemed very much within reach of a strong Forthill batting line up.

David and Dalts opened up and were positive from the start and David unfortunately got bowled when looking in great nick. Clark joined Dalts and the two were coasting when Clark nicked one behind off the pad and was given out. This gave Falkland some encouragement and they battled away, but Dalts struck his way to a nice 50 and was well supported by Andy before he fell with a handful of runs needed. Jalees joined Man Of The Match Dalts to finish the game off and a reasonably comfortable 7 wicket victory was in the bag in gathering darkness.

This was a well deserved trophy for skipper Simmy and his men as the team has worked hard and generally progressed well over the last few years. It was with some surprise that we noted that Forthill XI had not captured this trophy since 1984 and in some respects it was maybe long overdue.

It was somewhat sobering for Simmy and Clark to look at the trophy and recall that they both played in the 1980 Two Counties Cup trophy winning side some 28 years earlier – and this made even more sobering when Dr Dalton announced that this event took place before he was even born…….

Special mention must be made at this juncture of our esteemed skipper. The ever popular Simmy showed his devotion to duty by not only driving home early from a family holiday in deepest Southern England to play in the game, he also did so on the occasion of his wedding anniversary. I doubt if his popularity at home matched that among his team mates last night, but this was a great reward for Simmy for his huge effort on behalf of Forthill XI over a number of years.

Special mention also to Angus who played in spite of his wife’s pending arrival. Also to Ian who finally has a medal in his trophy cabinet.

Other mention goes to the young lads who enjoyed their first senior triumph in the shape of messrs Mo, David, Andy and Elliot. This will hopefully be the first of many trophies in their career and is great reward for the effort they all put into their game.

Lastly, let’s not forget the other lads like Henry, Glenn and Adees who played their part in helping us get to the final and were unfortunate not to be involved.

So it was back to Forthill for a celebratory shandy, then for a king size kebab with special sauce, a pedalo marathon around Broughty harbour - before going home and giving the wife a suitable anniversary present. For the rest of the team apart from the skipper, we headed home to an early bed. For the youngsters it was to dream of future glories, for the older lads it was to have nightmares and wonder where the last 28 years had gone…………


Falkland XI Batting
116 for 7
Player name Runs
R Manson Caught  26
D Lawson Run out  2
S Lindsay Caught  0
C Hepburn Bowled  23
G Gallagher Caught  15
M Morris Stumped  7
St Meikle Not Out  16
Sc Meikle Run out  0
A Melville Not Out  5
G Lawson  
T Brunton  

Forfarshire Cricket Club Forthill XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Mo Chatterji5.0033133.006.60
Jalees Ahmed5.0035135.007.00
Andrew Wallace5.0024124.004.80
Elliot McCandless5.001929.503.80

Forfarshire Cricket Club Forthill XI Batting
117 for 3
Player Name RunsCatchesStumpingsRun outs
Andrew Dalton Not Out  59 1
David Salisbury Bowled  10
Clark McConnachie Caught  22
Andrew Wallace Bowled  15
Angus Hay  
Jalees Ahmed Not Out  8 1
Elliot McCandless   1
David Sim   2 1
Ian Potts  
Mo Chatterji  
Steven Sim  

Falkland XI Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
T Brunton5.0029129.005.80
G Gallagher3.0024124.008.00
S Lindsay3.502500.006.52
M Morris2.001200.006.00
A Melville3.0114114.004.67
C Hepburn2.001200.006.00