Dramatic win for Yorkshire over 50s.

 Posted by Tony Hutton

The keenly contested over fifties county championship has reached the play off stage and sixteen teams were in action on Sunday with a place in the quarter finals at stake. Yorkshire, previous winners on several occasions and always serious contenders, were in action at the Al-Murad Stadium. To the uninitiated, which no doubt included the visiting Surrey team, this is not the Middle East somewhere, but in fact the home of Elsecar cricket club in South Yorkshire.

Light rain during the morning and an annoyingly persistent drizzle meant that the scheduled 1 p.m. start had to be put back a couple of hours and the original 45 over game was reduced to 30 overs per side. This however gave us the opportunity to explore not only the neighbouring parkland, but the fascinating Elsecar Heritage centre which was the site of a coalmine and iron works many years ago.

Play gets underway at Elsecar.

When play did eventually get underway Yorkshire won the toss and put Surrey into bat, obviously believing that knowing their target to win would be an advantage. The visitors got off to a brisk start putting on 73 for the first wicket until Khawar Saleem was unfortunately run out backing up when the ball brushed the bowler's fingers before demolishing the wicket. He had made a useful 37. His partner Keith Fisher was now joined by Jonathan Wileman, who in the past had played for Nottinghamshire as well as Lincolnshire in the Minor Counties.

Surrey finding runs hard to get.

Wileman soon showed aggressive tendencies and hit a six into the pavilion seats. However he only made nine before being bowled by Jason Meadows. This seemed to slow the Surrey effort down somewhat and the loss of three more wickets, all to Stuart Hudson, including Keith Fisher after a valiant 54, seemed to have given Yorkshire the advantage. They bowled the last few overs very tightly and restricted Surrey to 165-5, which seemed a little below par.

Haider Jahangir bowling for Yorkshire.

Yorkshire's openers Nick Gaywood and Iqbal Khan also put on a good partnership but at a rather pedestrian pace, meaning the home side were behind the rate when both were out for the same score 31 each. Fortunately Bandula Ranjith and skipper Steve Foster accelerated the rate somewhat but when they were both out, the game was back in the melting pot.

Wicketkeeper Paul Fenn was now joined by Pudsey Congs legend Barbar Butt and surely they would see Yorkshire safely home as only eleven runs were needed from the two final overs. The penultimate over (the 29th), bowled by Cliff Hill, seemed to change that completely. After two dot balls, Fenn managed a single off the third. Barbar Butt then failed to score from the remaining three balls. So ten to win off the final over.

Barbar Butt - always the man for a crisis.

Tim Knight was entrusted with the task of bowling the vital final over. His first ball produced a single for Fenn, the second produced a mighty six from Barbar Butt (always the man for a crisis!). Now just three to win from four balls. Butt got another single, but then tragedy as he was run out by the bowler on the fourth ball. So three to win off two balls and Fenn somehow managed to produce a four from the penultimate ball to settle the argument once and for all.